
The Camp Nou
I walked out of the tunnel, my brand new expensive suit glimmering under the spotlights here in Barcelona. Me and Luis Enrique shared a few words on the touchline before the coin toss, wishing each other luck.
Always funny that isn't it, wishing the very person whom you wish to be unlucky so you can beat them, good luck. Sport can be a funny game.
I had drilled it into the lads in my team talk, if we don't score first we might as well pack our bags and sod off home, I secretly thought we had a lot better chance than the press and pundits were giving us, but I did, concede in my head at least that it was going to be a challenge.
Barcelona got us underway to a deafening roar from the 99,394 fans crammed into the stands for this clash. A chance to knock out the defending trophy holders, in your own stadium? The fans and players alike knew this could be a great night for them.
My lads started off with the energy and passion I demanded from them every single game, I have a little rule among the players, I allow you one bad foul each, so we can get stuck in and not get many red cards. Why have one 'enforcer' and leave him at risk of a double yellow for example, when you can allow every player a bad challenge?
No wonder the Spanish press hated me! Tonight just gave them even more reasons to.
Just three minutes into the game, Paul Pogba clattered Lionel Messi and sent the Argentine flying in the air, no foul, the ball found Neymar, who was then clattered by Jorge and the ball rolled out for a throw in.
Borussia Dortmund were here and they were physical as always.
Suddenly, another rash challenge from Jorge, left Neymar in another heap, but we counter-attacked, leaving the home side a man down. A quick pass to Pogba who switched the play out to the opposite flank, saw Mario Fernandes in enough space to look up and launch in an early cross.
At first it looked like there was no one any where near it, but suddenly the blonde quiff of Marco Reus could be seen leaping towards the ball, the deafening roar that followed was made by just a few thousand fans. The ones in yellow, as Reus headed the ball home after just six minutes. We had an away goal and now lead on aggregate.
Now I was doing the math in my head, if we score next, we lead 3-1 with two away goals, meaning Barcelona has to score three goals tonight alone to go through if we don't score again? It was too good to be true!
Just a few minutes later, Ruben Neves collected the ball in central midfield and pinged a pass out to towards Aubameyang, unfortunately the ball was woefully under hit and I was ready to berate the youngster when I saw Mats Hummels, the man I have never forgiven for walking out on us in the manner he did, tried to head the ball back to Marc-André ter Stegen but this was also woefully under hit.
Aubameyang latched onto the ball and rounded the helpless Marc-André ter Stegen who was left in no mans land by his centreback and my striker slotted the ball home and shushed the home fans as he celebrated.
All I could do is wink at Luis Enrique, as if to say, serves you right for tapping up my captain.
The next 30 minutes were enjoyable for me, we dominated possession, restricted Barca from having a shot and even hit the woodwork ourselves. However I was left fuming when Jordi Alba was able to nod home on the bring of half time to make it 2-1 on the night.
But I wasn't too worried, they still had to score twice without us scoring once, we were fine.
The second half, my men knew what to do, get stuck in!!! And get stuck in we did.
Boos cascaded down from the crowd as we kicked, pulled and pushed anything in a blue and red shirt. Anything that wasn't yellow and black, was quite frankly, bullied, by my men.
Between them, Messi, Suarez and Neymar hit the deck a good 13 times. The referee however, was more than happy for the game to be physical, not gifting the home side free kick after free kick.
In the end Barcelona just did not want to fight fire with fire and as the full time whistle sounded, I just turned round and shook hands with every single member of my staff and the players on the bench. A job well done indeed, we were onto the semi-finals.