There was a moment in Arsene Wenger's pre-match press conference at the San Siro when he was asked what advice he had for Milan manager Rino Gattuso.
"I don’t give him much advice," the boss said. "He was a great player here and he’s doing very well at moment. I'm not doing well so I can get advice from him!"
Wenger knows that both him and his team are under considerable pressure at the moment, but he was keen to project both calm and some levity to proceedings.
He is confident he can get the team back on track at the San Siro, and outlined the small steps that need to be taken to rebuild confidence.
"[We need] to fix reachable targets," he said. "Be practical, pragmatic – focus on what you can do better and analyse well what you didn’t do well and not be scared too much about the consequences of a bad result.
"Focus on defending better, playing quicker and doing more things together. Reachable targets to improve the team."
Henrikh Mkhitaryan won the Europa League with Manchester United last season, and Wenger hopes one of his most experienced players can drive us to similar success this term.
"I hope he will help us," he said. "At the moment, before thinking of winning the Europa League, we have to face Milan and try to give absolutely everything to qualify.
"It will be a tight game, a tight tie because Milan are going well so we have to focus on that."
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