Zidane: Roma are a great side

“Roma are a great side,” said the Madrid coach in his pre-match press conference on Monday. “They have some very good forwards, but I’m more interested in my own players. Lots of people think it’s going to be an easy game, but we know it’s going to be a tough one.”

Madrid won 2-0 at the Stadio Olimpico in the first leg, a match that saw Zidane make his European bow as a coach.

“You always want to take part in this kind of match – the feeling some games give you can’t be put into words. We need to play as well as possible in order to win the tie.

“I have a full squad available tomorrow except for [Karim] Benzema. It will be difficult to choose the line-up, but I always prefer to have more decisions to make, as is the case this time around. My players know what they need to do on the pitch and that’s defend when they don’t have the ball and try to attack when they do. We can’t focus on the league now – tomorrow night’s match against Roma is our most important game.”