Barcelona vs Tottenham: Mauricio Pochettino is a slick salesman but not a foolish dreamer

A Spurs win at the Nou Camp would rank with some of the greatest upsets in their history

There’s an immaculate salesmanship to Mauricio Pochettino when he talks ahead of big matches. Not that you notice it all the time, but then that’s the thing about the best salesmen: you don’t even realise you’re being sold something. He strides in, puffs his chest out and within 10 minutes you’re basically nodding along, persuaded that Tottenham are so unbelievably buzzing for this that it’s barely worth the opposition turning up.

Unfortunately for Tottenham, this is the Nou Camp and Barcelona have every intention of turning up, albeit not quite at full strength. With the group already won and qualification already secure, they can rest a few stars and simply enjoy themselves.

Their unbeaten home record in European competition stretches back 28 games and more than five years. In that time, they’ve averaged more than three goals a game. The season before last, Paris Saint-Germain came here with a four-goal head start and still lost, and that wasn’t even a very good Barcelona team. For Tottenham to come here and win would be an upset to rank with some of the very greatest in their history.

Of course, Pochettino’s no foolish dreamer. Even when he stated that his intention is “always to dominate the opponent”, he loaded it with more caveats than a Brexit withdrawal agreement. “It is so difficult to play Barcelona,” he admitted. “The quality they have is unbelievable. I know what they’re capable of doing. They’re not going to surprise us.”

That, perhaps, is Tottenham’s one trump card. Naturally Barcelona will do their opposition research, but it’s unlikely they’ll know or even care very much about facing Kyle Walker-Peters on the Spurs right flank. Walker-Peters, a right-back scheduled to start in the absence of Serge Aurier and Kieran Trippier, is 21 and has played a grand total of 12 minutes in the Premier League this season. And yet to listen to Pochettino, you would think it was Philippe Coutinho who should be the one having greasy nightmares.

“I want to remind you that a year and a half ago Kyle won the under-20 World Cup in Korea, and I think his talent is unbelievable,” Pochettino said. “Young players need the trust to play. I am so happy from the beginning of the season to have three very good, excellent players in that position, three with different qualities. But Kyle Walker-Peters has the qualities to perform in the best way. We trust in him, we believe in him. He is going to be a massive success at this football club.”

Kyle Walker-Peters has played just 12 Premier League minutes this season (EPA)

This, in many ways, is the essence of what Pochettino does. He somehow convinces the understudies, the misfits, the fringe acts, the undervalued, of their world-conquering potential. “I don’t care if they’ve got Goliath in their team,” Ian Botham would tell his Durham team-mates in the early 1990s, when they were perennial wooden spoon candidates. “If we all do our job, they can’t do theirs.”

And so in order to stop Barcelona doing their jobs, Tottenham will need to squeeze out every last drop of skill and energy. They won’t see much of the ball, so they’ll need a good idea of what to do with it when they do. They’ll need a plan if they pick up a few early yellow cards. They’ll need to keep their heads if Inter Milan storm into the lead against PSV Eindhoven. In every respect, this is a test like no other.

But in a weird way, you suspect that’s just how Pochettino likes it. The bigger the challenge, the more he puffs his chest out and blazons his message of hope. “I’m so optimistic,” he said. “Always we must think to arrive at our best. To approach such an important game thinking only to do the job we want to do, not what Barcelona want to do.”

As Spurs are about to find out, though, belief won’t be enough on its own.