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CHAMPIONS LEAGUE: Coupet undaunted by United test

/noticias.info/ "Results aren't always logical in football." This is the view of Olympique Lyonnais goalkeeper Grégory Coupet ahead of Tuesday's UEFA Champions League visit to Old Trafford – and fans of the French champions will hope he is proved right given the way the odds appear stacked against Alain Perrin's side.

Daunting mission
After drawing 1-1 with Manchester United FC at home, Lyon need either to record a high-scoring draw or to become the first cross-Channel visitors to win at the self-styled 'Theatre of Dreams'. No French team have prevailed in ten previous trips to the home of the Premier League title-holders yet the experienced Coupet, 35, sounds undaunted when he says: "We know we have to score but we know we have a team that are capable of scoring at any time in the game. We are conscious of that and that helps us.

'Fifty-fifty'
"We know that the way United play, they will come out and attack so that gives us a chance to play," added Coupet, who hopes that crossing swords with "a big club in a big stadium" will bring the best out of a Lyon side who have struggled for form at times this season. "We have to go out there and show fight, desire, effort. I see the game as 50-50 at the moment."

Blackburn memory
Coupet knows at least something about success on English soil having been part of the only previous Lyon triumph here, a 1-0 victory at Blackburn Rovers FC in the first round of the 1998/99 UEFA Cup. Back then Lyon had not even won a single French championship – the first of their six successive Ligue 1 crowns came in 2002 – but their progress in the intervening decade means they should not face United with an inferiority complex, according to Coupet.

'Determined'
"We are not on the scale of a Manchester United as a club – in comparison, we are a small club in terms of what they have achieved nationally and internationally – but that makes us more determined. We have developed. We have come a long way and the pleasure in sport is having a go. You go in with determination, desire and belief, and who knows? Results aren't always logical in football."

Return from injury
Coupet missed the entire group stage because of a cruciate ligament injury but believes he has returned with an improved perspective. "It is great being 100 per cent. I feel great in myself, but I still have to work on my knee. The good news is I don't feel any pain after playing or training. When you are out such a long time it helps to put things into perspective, outside of football as well as inside the game." notas_de_prensa_archivo