PSG boss sends Liverpool warning before Champions League 'final' | OneFootball

Paris Saint-Germain manager Luis Enrique has warned that his royally in-form French champions will "attack" Liverpool in next week's Champions League round-of-16 tie, which the Spanish boss described as a "50-50" game.

PSG extended their staggering winning streak to ten matches across all competitions with a 4-1 blitz at home to Lille on Saturday night. Enrique described the opening 45 minutes, which saw the capital club rack up four unanswered goals, as "the best first half of this season".

Lille are no helpless patsies - as Enrique was keen to point out. Bruno Genesio's side are also in the Champions League round of 16 and have defeated both Madrid clubs in Europe's premier competition this season. Lille even pushed Liverpool close in the league phase of the newly expanded tournament despite losing 2-1.

"It shows our current level," Enrique said of PSG's convincing victory in Paris. "Now we have to think about the Champions League, two matches against Liverpool, think about recovering and be ambitious."

"We are not going to change much," the former Spain boss warned, "today was a test, Liverpool and Lille have similar things, we put them under such pressure that they could no longer play from the back, they had to play long.

PSG's Ousmane Dembele has been in blistering form this calendar year / DAMIEN MEYER/GettyImages

"It will be different, it will be very complicated of course, but we are in the best period of the season. We will play against the best team in Europe, qualified brilliantly, but it is not in our mentality to speculate, protect ourselves, stay defensive, we will attack and we will try to turn that in our favour."

Given the respective strengths of both sides, Enrique admitted that this last-16 tie "could have been a Champions League final". In reality, PSG's poor start to this season's European campaign forced them into a play-off against Brest before they were paired with Liverpool - who boasted the best record across the entire opening phase.

Liverpool manager Arne Slot was deliberately non-committal when reacting to the round-of-16 draw which tossed up this mouth-watering two-legged tie, but acknowledged the "challenge" of playing such an in-form team.

The Reds travel to the French capital for the first half of this double header on Wednesday before welcoming PSG to Anfield in the decisive second leg on Tuesday, 11 March.