Blanc relishing Ibra-Verratti return

Laurent Blanc says he is looking forward to getting two of his big guns back for Paris Saint-Germain’s Champions League clash with Barcelona.

Both Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Marco Verratti were absent through suspension for last week’s 3-1 first leg quarter-final defeat to the Catalans at the Parc des Princes.

However, the Frenchman is banking on them making a difference at the Camp Nou on Tuesday, particularly Ibrahimovic against his former club.

“The first game put is in trouble but we’ve got two of our main players back and maybe we can show we weren’t in good condition in Paris.

“Ibrahimovic loves these kind of games. I’ve no doubt that if he’d played in the first game he would have helped us because it’s important to have goalscorers in your team. When you don’t have them you realise their importance.

“’Ibra’ has been training every day and even when he doesn’t play he is still in great shape. He is still the same player he was last year and is well rested for the games to come.

“We need goals and the better condition he is in then the better for us.”

Blanc also defended the performance of David Luiz in Paris, when the two ‘nutmegs’ he suffered at the hands of Luis Suarez both resulted in goals.

“I’m not making excuses but David was not ready to play an hour and 10 minutes. We said that if we didn’t need him then perfect, because he was just recovering from injury.

“He needed to go on the pitch and we know what kind of game he had, but there is no need to keep going back to it.

“David is aware of what happened because he is a great professional,” he concluded.

Tags Ibrahimovic Laurent Blanc Paris Saint-Germain Verratti
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