ARIAS ON COPA DEL REY CLASH WITH ATLÉTICO: "A GOOD OPPORTUNITY TO STRAIGHTEN THINGS OUT"

Sevilla FC Director of Football, Óscar Arias, gave his evaluation to SFC media of the complicated Copa del Rey quarter-final tie that will pit Sevilla against Atlético Madrid: "It's one of the most important teams in the competition, they sit third place in La Liga and logically have the highest ambitions... We're going to see if we are able to give ourselves a lift... We have to be optimistic, knowing the difficulties and knowing that we're facing a potentially very good opponent... We are very excited and we're going to confront the tie with the aim of getting through. It's clearly possible, we're not in our best form but we're going to work to come into the tie in the best shape possible. I'm sure we're going to have our chances. The prospect of getting into the semi-finals is hugely attractive and we'll confront this match with a lot of enthusiasm because we have aspirations to go as far as possible". 

Arias also added: "It's going to be a complicated and difficult tie but also open, exciting and a good chance to straighten things out... The team needs to find itself, its style, its pattern and this is a magnificent chance; it's going to be very complicated, very difficult, but we hope we can take advantage of it".

Finally, he seemed satisfied by the second-leg falling in the Sánchez-Pizjuán: "playing the second-leg at home in an even game means you have the fans factor in your favour and that could be important and make the difference. You also have the disadvantage that when you play at home away goals count double so that can punish you - but I'm happy".