Al Rayyan coach Laurent Blanc spoke to the media ahead of their 2020-21 season QNB Stars League Week 19 match against Al Arabi.

“All matches are important for us as we are always looking for full points, We prepare for that with the technical, medical and administrative staff, and the players, so we are ready to win against Al Arabi also. In football, everyone is looking for victory. We won against Al Ahli last week and all matches before the end of the season will be very important.

“I do not have a specific plan for Al Arabi, Al Sadd or Al Duhail, but the important thing for me is my team and the players, so we have to play at the level of Al Rayyan. This is the important thing, we have been working all week on that.

“I have seen the strengths and weaknesses of Al Arabi. I have watched many matches of Al Arabi. The first game I watched after reaching Qatar was the 2019-20 season Amir Cup final between Al Arabi and Al Sadd. They have a good team, standout attackers and they play magnificently from the sides through cross balls, which they exploit through attackers such as Sebastian (Soria).

“But the important thing for me is preparing my team. I would like to prepare my team in such a way that we will be focused on creating many problems for Al Arabi. This is what we do in training and I hope to see its result this week too. Al Arabi are a good team and Al Rayyan respect them,” said Blanc.

Al Rayyan player Gabriel Mercado said, “I think it will be very difficult, they are performing at a great level, as are we. It will be a great game. Of course, we can win, we need to fight and play well, and we definitely need to win because our goal is to finish the season in the top four. So we cannot lose any point and we have to do our best to win the three points.

“Certainly, we know very well Sebastian, (Yousef) Msakni and Mehrdad (Mohammadi). They are very special players and we must be wary of them. We play as one team and we have to give off our best because we need to win.”