Manuel Pellegrini says his Manchester City players are 'fresh' for Champions League showdown with Barcelona .

Manuel Pellegrini believes Manchester City are now better-equipped to deal with Barcelona after the Catalans knocked them out of the Champions League 12 months ago.

The Chilean thinks that his men are fresher than they were when the La Liga giants triumphed 4-1 last year thanks to the fact that this time they are not juggling the FA Cup and Capital One Cup.

However, he admitted the Premier League champions will miss the suspended Yaya Toure. 

Speaking ahead of Tuesday night's last 16 first leg, Pellegrini said: 'I think that last year was different to this year. We arrived at this stage after playing 19 games in two months, I don’t think it was our best moment. I hope this year we will do it after not playing so many games.'

City came through a traumatic group stage, only progressing thanks to a win at Roma in the last match.

But Pellegrini believes the experience will stand them in good stead. 

'We never thought we were out,' he said.

'We always have the trust to continue to fight to the end. We didn’t play well but our team demonstrated the personality and quality to qualify against Bayern and Roma.'

This year Pellegrini will be able to unleash a fully fit Sergio Aguero. The Argentina striker sat out the first leg last February and could only manage 45 minutes at the Nou Camp.

'It is very important,' said Pellegrini. 

'I think that Sergio is one of the five top players in the world. When he is 100% fit, it is very difficult to stop him. Last year he couldn’t play the way he wanted to do it. Sergio is coming back from a long injury but between Everton he is adding minutes and seeing him against Stoke and Newcastle, I think he is in his best performance.'

Pellegrini is confident that City can deal with the loss of Toure, who sits out the last 90 minutes of a three-match ban.

'I prefer to play with Yaya and I think we play better with him,' he said.

'We can play without Yaya - also we played without him against Roma and Bayern and I think we have a good squad to replace him.' 

Source:Dailymail.