Last 16, second leg, kick-off: 19:45 (BST)
Manchester United (0) v Marseille (0)
Sir Alex Ferguson is expecting a tense night at Old Trafford as his Manchester United team seek to defeat Marseille and reach the Champions League quarter-finals for the fifth successive season.
The sides shared a goalless draw three weeks ago in France and the United boss is only too aware of the dangers of conceding an away goal on the counter-attack.
“European games are always nervy, but it’s nice to have that bit of apprehension ahead of big ties like this,” he said. “We’re up against a very experienced, powerful Marseille team who’ll want to play well. We’ve had them watched twice away from home against Monaco and Rennes and they showed the qualities we expect to see again tomorrow.
“Marseille will try and hit us on the break, but there are lots of ways of counterattacking in the modern game. It’s my first time up against Didier so I’ve not got enough knowledge of him to say how he’ll approach the game.
The United manager has received a bonus with the quicker-than-expected return to fitness of Nani.
“There’s a good chance Nani will be involved tomorrow, as he trained on Sunday also,” added Ferguson. “Michael Carrick did too, which is also positive news for us. Both should be involved tomorrow night. It was a fantastic bonus to get 45 minutes from [Antonio] Valencia [in the 2-0 FA Cup win against Arsenal], since he’s been out for so long. The question is whether to start him or do what we did on Saturday and use him from the bench, but it’s a nice selection dilemma for me.”
Nemanja Vidic missed training due to a knock sustained at the weekend but is expected to be fit. Rio Ferdinand, Park Ji-Sung, Michael Owen and Anderson are all sidelined.
Marseille coach Didier Deschamps acknowledged that the omens weren’t great for his side.
“If you look at the stats then it looks a difficult task,” he said. “Manchester United have not been beaten at home for [24] games and have only conceded one goal in seven Champions League matches this season.
“Though it’s three or four years since Manchester United last won this trophy, thanks to their status they’re always among four or five teams that are favourites to win at the start of every season. On paper you’d expect them to qualify but we’ve got every chance as well – football’s not played on paper.
Deschamps was quick to identify the threat posed by the fit-again Nani.
“Nani did well in the first leg, he created one or two problems for us,” said the Marseille coach. “What I like about him is that he speeds the game up and every attack involving Nani is fast, but equally the likes of Rooney, Chicharito and Giggs can all create problems for us tomorrow. We’re only likely to get around three or four chances during the whole game so we’ll have to be very precise in our finishing.
“Having watched the game against Arsenal first hand, I’m not sure what tactics Sir Alex will play, but we’ll do our best to attack them while keeping things tight at the back and trying not to give anything away.”
Mathieu Valbuenashould be available, along with André-Pierre Gignac, who was taken off towards the end of Friday’s league match but has been included in the travelling party.
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