Manchester City vs Bayern Munich: 'It is going to be strange to play against Frank Lampard and not be Chelsea,' says Xabi Alonso
Champions League clash starts at 7.45pm
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Your support makes all the difference.Bayern Munich's Xabi Alonso has insisted ahead of a midfield battle with Manchester City's Frank Lampard in the Champions League tonight that he carries no grudge about the Englishman breaking his ankle during a tough in-field relationship between the two.
Lampard will start in midfield for City tonight, with both Yaya Toure and Fernadinho suspensed after their dismissals during the club's defeat to CSKA Moscow in the previous group stage game. That brings him up against Bayern's Alonso.
Lampard's bad tackle on Alonso during a Chelsea match against Liverpool in 2005 always seemed to create a needle between the two of them. In 2009, another bad tackle on Alonso saw Lampard sent off.
But Alonso, who has been the Champions League's outstanding midfielder in this campaign, insisted that he was putting that in the past.
Alonso said: "It is going to be strange to play against him and not be Chelsea. He had a great career for Chelsea and he has been one of the most important players in the Premier League in the last years. We can enjoy it, competitive games in the league, Champions League, FA Cup, in semi-finals. We have had fewer ties (recently) but we have good relations and I wish him best of luck with his next stage. We are great competitors in football."
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