Cucurella grew up in Catalonia and his first experience of live football came watching Barcelona at the Camp Nou.

He later joined the club and spent eight years in their youth ranks, eventually representing Barcelona B in the Spanish second division. He left at the age of 21 to further his career at Getafe before coming to England.

Cucurella has moved on from that past, impressing in the Premier League with first Brighton & Hove Albion and now Chelsea, but the chance to take on Barcelona still holds meaning for the Spanish international.

‘It is a very special game for my family and me,’ he said. ‘I think I played against them a lot of years ago, so now we have the opportunity to play in the Champions League, on a special night.

‘I think now I'm at a good level; I have good confidence. We have a really good team, so this helped me as well. I don't think about what could have happened, because maybe if I had stayed at Barcelona, I wouldn’t have had the opportunity to win the trophies I have won with Chelsea.

‘I think everything happens for a reason. I'm very happy with my career, very happy to play for Chelsea and tomorrow to play this big game.

‘Chelsea against Barcelona is always a very good game. Hopefully tomorrow we can have a good game and win the three points.’

The meeting with Barcelona kicks off an important week for the Blues, as we also host top-of-the-table Arsenal in the Premier League on Sunday. While victory in the two games would give our chances in both competitions a boost, Cucurella is reluctant to put too much emphasis on individual fixtures this early in the season.

‘It's a big week, I think all the players want to play these games because they always have a special feeling,’ the Spaniard continued. ‘Everyone is very focused and they want to try to do their best.

‘I think we have a good opportunity but we need to know that, yes, while it is two big games they are nothing more than three points. I think if we win these games, for sure we will have more confidence and everyone will start to speak about you, but we need to remember we are only in November.

‘We have a long run ahead, so we need to continue in this moment. It's true that we want to win trophies, but we just need to continue what we are doing, playing our level, enjoy winning games, and let's see what this team is able to do.’

Cucurella also explained why he believes this Chelsea side has already developed and improved since we began this season’s Champions League campaign with a loss at Bayern Munich, underlining that gaining more consistency is the next step for the Blues.

‘Every week, we try always to improve. For example, in the first game, for some of the players in their first Champions League game it's a bit tough, and we play away as well against a big team.

‘After a couple of games, we are settling. We are more calm. I feel we are more mature now. We know better the things that we need to do. I think we showed last season at the end that we are a better team than before. We are showing that we're better again.

‘It's true that we need to stay with what we are doing, now that we know the game it is not good enough to get a couple of wins and then drop a little bit. We need to always stay at our best level if we want to compete for big things.’