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Manchester Evening News
Manchester Evening News
Sport
Dan O'Toole

Matthijs de Ligt asked for Ajax semi-final preference ahead of Man City vs Tottenham

Ajax captain Matthijs de Ligt says his side have no fear going into their first Champions League semi-final, where they will face the winners of Manchester City's tie with Tottenham.

The Dutch side beat Juventus 2-1 in Turin on Tuesday night - with de Ligt heading in the winner - to progress to the last four with a 3-2 aggregate victory, having beaten Real Madrid over two legs in the last 16.

City are a goal down against Spurs after Heung-Min Son's 78th-minute goal went unanswered last Tuesday, with the Blues underwhelming against their Premier League rivals.

Pep Guardiola's side were dumped out of the competition at the same stage by Liverpool last season, but de Ligt would have no qualms about facing the record-breaking Premier League title holders in the next round.

"At the moment I don't have any preference but we will see who's coming to the semi-final and then we have to show the same as today," the Ajax captain, 19, said.

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"We're never satisfied, the next game is going to be also important and we'll see what happens.

"We've showed the world what we can do. We showed it in the Bernabéu, we showed it against Bayern Munich, we showed it here against Juventus. There's so much potential in this team, we're all still quite young and you see us grow every game.

"We know as players we have a lot of technical quality so we don't have any fear for any opponent. We know we can play and as you see we are really good at the moment. We have no fear at the moment."

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