Juventus better than Barcelona and won´t collapse like PSG – Lippi

Juventus are better than Barcelona and will not collapse in the same way as Paris Saint-Germain at Camp Nou, according to their former head coach, Marcello Lippi.

The Serie A leaders dispatched Barca in ruthless fashion in the first leg of their Champions League quarter-final tie, with Paulo Dybala scoring twice in a 3-0 win in Turin.

Barca suffered a 4-0 loss to PSG in the away leg of their last-16 tie before recording a record-breaking 6-1 triumph in the second leg to progress to the last eight.

Lippi, however, says Juve are unlikely to allow such a comeback to take place.

“Barca’s arsenal is unique but it’s only in the attacking sense,” he told La Stampa. “Juventus are the better team and if they can disconnect the front three as they managed to in the first leg, they have a great chance of winning the second leg.

“They have to play the same as they did in Turin, exploiting all their virtues, because they won’t be able to stop them.

“Barca will try in front of 90,000 spectators, and they did it well against PSG, but Juve are not PSG. I don’t imagine Juve will allow it to happen. But, in football, of course anything can happen.”

Lippi took Juve to four Champions League finals across two hugely successful spells at the club, although their triumph against Ajax in 1996 was the only time they lifted the trophy.

The last final they reached under Lippi was in the 2002-03 season, a campaign in which they beat Barca 3-2 on aggregate in the quarter-final after a 2-1 second-leg win in Spain, with Pavel Nedved and Marcelo Zalayeta scoring the goals to send the 10-man visitors through.

“It was a great game,” Lippi recalled. “In that Champions League, we beat Spanish football because we also won against Deportivo La Coruna and Real Madrid.”