Chelsea v PSG: We will not join in with Diego Costa's games, warns Laurent Blanc

 
Fighting Talk: Blanc hits out at Chelsea striker
Getty
Tom Farmery11 March 2015

Paris St Germain manager Laurent Blanc has told his players not to get drawn into the mind games of Chelsea's Diego Costa when the two sides meet on Wednesday in the second leg of their last-16 Champions League tie.

Blanc's side go into the second leg at Stamford Bridge after holding Jose Mourinho's men to a 1-1 draw in Paris three weeks ago.

His side will need to score to prevent Chelsea winning on away goals but he has instructed his players not to become too hasty in their approach, especially when it comes to handling striker Costa.

He said: “He likes contact, and provokes opposition players. That’s part of his game. He thrives off that.

“He really needs that to bring out the best in his performances. The most important thing is to not get caught up in the way he plays.

"He will try to provoke a reaction. We need to stay calm, not get caught up in his game. We need to be as effective as possible in stopping him. It’s up to us to try to take some risks but not lose our heads and take unnecessary risks.

“Paris Saint-Germain need to stand up and be counted. We also need to stay in the game. That’s the difficulty. Yes, we need to attack, yes, we need to create chances, but we also need to stay solid.”

PSG v Chelsea - player ratings

1/22

Blanc was in charge of PSG last season when they lost to the Blues on away goals in west London after they had won the first leg 3-1 in Paris.

This time, though, Blanc says his side will need to attack well if they are to progress to the quarter-finals of the Champions League.

“Chelsea have a slight advantage, because they were able to score an away goal," he said.

"It’s up to us to try to do what Chelsea did in Paris. One of Chelsea’s main threats is the fact they’re very good on the counterattack, so I don’t think we should go gung ho.

“We have to attack and we need to score a goal, regardless of whether Chelsea get one or not. I hope we do better than Chelsea did in the first leg. Chelsea created only one chance and they scored from that. I hope we create more than one chance.”

Create a FREE account to continue reading

eros

Registration is a free and easy way to support our journalism.

Join our community where you can: comment on stories; sign up to newsletters; enter competitions and access content on our app.

Your email address

Must be at least 6 characters, include an upper and lower case character and a number

You must be at least 18 years old to create an account

* Required fields

Already have an account? SIGN IN

By clicking Create Account you confirm that your data has been entered correctly and you have read and agree to our Terms of use , Cookie policy and Privacy policy .

This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.

Thank you for registering

Please refresh the page or navigate to another page on the site to be automatically logged in