Why Spurs v Juventus will be a family affair | OneFootball

Tottenham Hotspur manager Mauricio Pochettino has a special reason to look forward to facing Juventus in the Champions League.

Spurs and Juve were drawn against each other in Monday’s draw for the round of 16 and will meet in the first leg at Juventus Stadium on 13 February.

And the Argentine boss – whose surname means “a little bit” in Italian – is thoroughly looking forward to taking on Massimiliano Allegri’s side for both personal and professional reasons.

“It’s fantastic because my family came from Italy, from Turin — unbelievable!” said Pochettino in reaction to the draw.

“My surname is from Italy. It’s a city and a club I’ve always wanted to play and it’s now fantastic to be going to the city of Turin to play against Juventus.

And after topping a group which featured Real Madrid and Borussia Dortmund, Pochettino feels his team have no reason to fear anyone they may come up against in Europe’s elite competition.

“It’s so important to be competitive and we’ve shown we can do that, we’ve shown we can deal with the pressure of the Champions League,” he said.

“This will be a different game to Real Madrid and it’s so exciting to play Juventus.”

Meanwhile, Bianconeri defender Mehdi Benatia also appears to be eagerly anticipating this mouth-watering clash.

“Focus” wrote the Moroccan on his official Twitter account.

These two sides have never met in a competitive fixture but Spurs did run out 2-0 winners in a pre-season friendly at Wembley in August.