Man City Women face Fiorentina in first leg of Women's Champions League last-16 tie on Wednesday; club monitoring fitness of Keira Walsh (hamstring), Janine Beckie (calf) and Lauren Hemp (ankle) ahead of game
Wednesday 3 March 2021 17:11, UK
Gareth Taylor believes Manchester City are good enough to win the Women's Champions League.
City, who play Fiorentina in the last 16, are hoping to go further in this season's competition having lost to Atletico Madrid at the same stage last term.
Italian side Fiorentina, who were last season's Serie A runners-up, face another English test after losing 6-0 on aggregate to Arsenal last year.
"I believe we can win it, I think we're good enough to win it," boss Taylor said.
"Actually achieving that is the hard part. I think cup competitions, you don't really tend to get any second chances.
"We've seen over the years that Lyon have been really consistent in this competition and really dominated, so that's going to be difficult to change. There's a lot of really good teams still at this last-16 stage."
Lyon ended Manchester City's run at the semi-final stage of the club's first two Champions League campaigns in 2016-17 and 2017-18, but Taylor believes they can be boosted by experienced new signings.
"I think in anything you want to progress," he added. "There's a nucleus of the team that experienced that (the previous Champions League exits).
"Obviously I wasn't here, but the fundamentals of the team were here. But then we've also added other players who have been successful in this competition.
"They've joined us and the likes of Chloe (Kelly) have come in as well and the American girls (Abby Dahlkemper, Rose Lavelle and Sam Mewis). There's been quite a bit of change. Whichever game we go out to play, we go out to win, we go out to impose our game on the opposition.
"Regardless of what happens tomorrow, I don't think the tie will be over. We'll be looking forward to going to Florence a week later and enjoying that experience and again, trying to be successful."
Kelly, who joined from Everton last summer, believes the accolades and trophies won by her more experienced team-mates adds to her desire to succeed in competitions like the Champions League.
"We were sat at the dinner table the other night talking about Sam winning the World Cup and Lucy (Bronze) winning the Champions League," Kelly said.
"Hearing those stories is very exciting for me as a young player. It just makes me even hungrier to do that.
"To see those experiences that they've come through and see them just telling the story with a smile on their face is very exciting and something that we all want to do as a team. It's very exciting for us, especially the young players."
