Koeman says he admires both Messi and Ronaldo
Dec 07, 2020
Barcelona [Spain], December 7 : Barcelona manager Ronald Koeman hailed both Lionel Messi and Juventus' Cristiano Ronaldo while stressing that both players are different and "it is not nice" to pick one over the other.
Barcelona are gearing up for the Champions League clash against Juventus, which will see Messi and Ronaldo come face to face.
"It's fantastic that these two players have been so long at this top level in the world. They are the best players, in my opinion, in the last 10-15 years. Being successful all this time is incredible. It's a great compliment to those players," Goal.com quoted Koeman as saying.
"They are different, but they have incredible stats about scoring goals, hat-tricks, about winning prizes. It's not nice to say who is better because both are incredible, I admire both players because they gave us so many nice evenings with great goals, with great titles. Let's hope we can enjoy them tomorrow night," he added.
Barcelona will be high on confidence as they defeated Juventus 2-0 the last time they met. However, at that time, Barcelona enjoyed a massive advantage as the Italian side was without their star player Ronaldo, who had to miss the clash after testing positive for coronavirus.
Koeman is aware of the threat that Ronaldo can pose and said Barcelona will have to defend well against the Portuguese.
"For us it is not an extra motivation because of an individual player. We always thought of this as an important match with two big teams meeting. The two teams are going to fight for first position in the group," he said.
"It's always important the best players are there. I think Cristiano Ronaldo is still one of the best, he always scores and always fights. Because of his daily work he is still in the elite in our sport. It's a great compliment to him. Not just any player can do that. We have to defend well against him and when we have the ball that danger goes away," Koeman added.
Barcelona will take on Juventus in the Champions League on Wednesday.
