Mourinho: Barca’s long road trip won’t matter
Barça’s high-profile stars were forced to undertake a 600-mile coach trip to Milan due to the air travel restrictions in force across Europe caused by the ash cloud from the Icelandic volcano.
The reigning European champions began their journey Sunday afternoon and did not arrive in northern Italy until early yesterday following an overnight stopover in the Frenchresort of Cannes.
But Mourinho believes Barça will be unaffected by the alterations to their travel plans.
“I don’t think it will matter,” said the former Chelsea boss. “It is their body, their mind that has to respond.
“If it happened to me, I would try to transform a problem into motivation, something to enjoy, to have the squad together due to a difficulty. It doesn’t seem like a drama to me.”
With Barça having successfully sidestepped the affects of one force of nature, speculation now switches to another, with Lionel Messi expected to take centre stage again tonight.
The Argentina international has been in stunning form during Barça’s run to the last four, scoring eight goals, four of which came in the quarter-final demolition of Arsenal earlier this month.
Messi has netted 40 times in all competitions this season andMourinho admits it is difficult to know how to handle his threat given the fluid tactics employed by Barça coach Pep Guardiola.
“Above all let’s see how they play because I don’t know,” Mourinho said.
“None of us know. He could play right, left, centre. We don’t know. What we know is that he is animportant player and football, for me, is not about marking man to man. It’s not for me.
“Tomorrow it is not one against Messi and 10 v 10, it will be 11 v 11, although he deserves special attention.”
For all Mourinho’s famed mind games, the psychological advantage will assuredly rest with Barcelona tonight after they got the better of Inter in the group stage.
Both sides qualified from Group F but it was Barça that topped the pile after drawing away in Milan andwinning 2-0 at the Nou Camp in November.
Mourinho concedes Barça were “far superior” in those meetings, but does not expect history to repeat itself over their two-legged semi.
“In the second game in the group, Barça showed that they are far superior. They won easily, deserved to win and in that game we were not capable of responding to them,” he conceded.
“But that was November, many months ago. They have followed their path, we have followed ours and it seems like we are a lot better than we were in November.”
Left-back Davide Santon and goalkeeper Francesco Toldo are the only absentees for Inter, whileMourinho is expected to move full-back Maicon into a more advanced role to bolster his midfield.
Opposing coach Guardiola admitted the route take to Milan was not ideal preparation but he insisted it would not alter his side’s will to win, and certainly would not be used as anexcuse.
“We want to show that we arecoming here to play our usual game and try to score as many goals as we can,” Guardiola said.
“We try to do that wherever we are. We have got to always be ourselves and we have got to aim to win.
“We could have stayed at home and we would have lost the game 3-0because UEFA say we have to be here, so we are here and we are here to win.
“It is not an ideal situation after a game on Saturday to sit on a bus for 14 hours to come to Milan for a Champions League semi-final, but we cannot stop the volcano.
“Many people in Europe have been blocked by it and we are just one of many. The only option was to take a bus, which was the easiest way. We decided to come on two buses so the players could be comfortable, and that is the main thing.
“We need to play two great games and we will try to win, but we can also lose because we are playing against one of the best teams in Europe.
“They have been awesome in the Champions League, won their last five games and so it is a difficult opening leg.’’
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