Pep Guardiola doesn't want his Manchester City players to give Bayern too much respect in their Champions League quarter-final.
City are aiming to make the semi-final for the third straight year and to do so by knocking out the Bundesliga giants would be one of the most impressive victories in their history in the competition. Bayern, of course, have far greater stories from this tournament but the Blues have a three-goal advantage over them as they look to go further than ever in the competition.
Guardiola does not want the team to lose sight of the progress they have made for the club over the last seven years by making it a norm for them to be competing in the latter stages. However, they cannot afford to get starry-eyed thinking about the tournament and Bayern's history in it as they look to finish the job.
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"We are focused on what we want to do, try to not just control but finish them, understand the game and the fact we are here in Munich against one of the most historic teams in this competition," he said.
"We come here to play a football game, 11 v 11, try to do better than the opponent in this game. If you think about what we’ve done in the past, it would be a big mistake not to do our game - that’s what we’ve talked about in the last few days.
"It’s nice to challenge them [Bayern] and travel around Europe to play these teams, we weren't there one decade ago - we watched on TV. It’s nice to be here and try to make the semi-final once again.
"This is our model. What do you do to achieve it? Be yourself as much as possible and do your game as much as possible."
City have suffered some painful exits under Guardiola, and arguably none more so than last year when they were two goals up in the 180th minute of their tie against Real Madrid but contrived to lose. Captain Ilkay Gundogan wants the team to use those memories as motivation.
"The further you get, the bigger the hunger to win it. I don't know who apart from the manager won this competition, I don't think anyone but we were close," he said.
"I was close at Dortmund in 2013 and most of the squad was close a couple of years ago but it was not meant to be. That just increases the desire to get back to the final and lift the trophy. That is what the club and this group of players deserve."
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