Steve McManaman has heaped praise on Pedri and hailed him as Barcelona’s best player over Lamine Yamal. The English pundit believes that the Spaniard is also better than Raphinha and Robert Lewandowski, who have been in fine form this season.
Speaking on TNT Sports after Barcelona’s 4-0 win over Borussia Dortmund, McManaman claimed that Barcelona’s front three were getting all the credit for their wins. However, he feels that Pedri is the best player in the squad and admitted that he was a ‘huge fan’ of the young midfielder. He said via METRO:
“We speak about Barcelona’s front three [Lewandowski, Yamal and Raphinha] but Pedri is the best player they’ve got. He’s a lovely player. He was the child superstar and then he got that really bad injury that set him back a bit. But he’s back now and he’s been excellent this year for Barcelona. I’m a huge fan of his.”
Barcelona are 4-0 up after the first leg, but Hansi Flick is not counting the chickens. The Catalan side’s manager has insisted that their place in the semifinal is not sealed yet and said:
“We’re not through yet. Winning by this many goals is important and, when a team plays as well as that, goals normally do flow. We aren’t thinking we are through because you simply never know what might happen. Football is madness. We’ll be determined to play like this again next week.”
“Dortmund are a good team and so we are already aware that we need to travel over there and commit as few errors as possible. Our three guys up front are terrific and very important but so is our defence… and our guys who come off the bench and somehow manage to hit the same performance level as the players they replace.”
Raphinha opened the scoring in the 25th minute before Robert Lewandowski’s quick goals in the second half made it 3-0. Lamine Yamal sealed the big win in the 77th minute with a superb finish.
Barcelona star Pedri comments on Lamine Yamal
Pedir has admitted that he advises Lamien Yamal and ‘clips his ears’ when needed. He believes that the teenager needs to keep doing what he has done so far and said via GOAL:
“I tell him to keep doing what he’s doing, to keep having fun. Although sometimes you have to clip his ears… but that’s okay.”
In another interview this month, Pedri compared Lamine Yamal to Lionel Messi and said via GOAL:
“The feeling is similar to the one we had with Leo: knowing that something good could happen to us.”
Lamine Yamal has been doing well for Barcelona this season and has scored six goals in 27 LaLiga matches, while assisting 11 times. He has another 4 goals and 3 assists in his 10 UEFA Champions League matches for the club.
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Edited by Vaishnavi Iyer
