Kevin De Bruyne is on a mission to banish the personal anguish of Manchester City's Champions League final defeat to Chelsea two years ago.
De Bruyne's participation in the Porto final, which City lost 1-0, ended after a sickening collision with Chelsea's Antonio Rudiger just before the hour mark.
City playmaker De Bruyne suffered a broken nose, broken eye socket and concussion in the clash and the tearful star was taken to a nearby hospital as his team-mates failed to stop Chelsea from winning.
After being discharged from hospital, De Bruyne tweeted: "Hi guys just got back from the hospital. My diagnosis is acute nose bone fracture and left orbital fracture. I feel okay now. Still disappointed about yesterday obviously but we will be back."
Against that backdrop of personal pain and disappointment, De Bruyne has more reason than most of Pep Guardiola's side to want to beat Inter Milan on Saturday to finally conquer Europe and clinch an historic Treble.
Reflecting on that 2021 Champions League heartache in the wake of Saturday's FA Cup final victory over Manchester United, De Bruyne smiled and said: “That's football.
“I'd never broken anything in my life and I came out of the Champions League final with a broken nose, a broken eye socket and concussion.
“It happens. There was nothing more I could do. I wished it was better, but it wasn’t.”
Talk of the Treble at City was banned by Guardiola until they had bagged the FA Cup, with De Bruyne, 31, claiming the players have always felt they are capable of winning all three trophies.
“There was belief anyway, but there was no point talking about it before,” said De Bruyne after Saturday's Wembley triumph.
“We know now. I want to win the Champions League and I want to win the Treble, but we were getting ready to win the game against United. We deserved to win. I'm very happy and very proud. We should enjoy next weekend and hopefully we can perform the best we can.
“But Inter are a very good team. Finals are 50-50. We were favourites against United, but it's always difficult. You have to manage these moments.
“There will be moments when it's tough, but in the big moments we have to try to do our job. Inter have great players and we have respect for them. They haven’t got to the final by beating easy teams.”
Asked if City are ready to finally go all the way in Europe, after coming so close in recent seasons, De Bruyne said: “I can answer that question next weekend.
“I don’t see it that way. We've performed really well. We've been in so many quarter-finals, semi-finals and two finals. We've been there most of the time.”
Guardiola said City need to win the Champions League to be considered a truly great team, but De Bruyne claimed the careers of the players will not be defined by one game.
“It depends who you ask,” said De Bruyne. “Most of the guys have been incredible anyway. Will it help? Yes. But one 90 minutes doesn’t define a career.
“I'm on around 700 career games, so one 90 minutes out of 700 doesn’t define my career. Obviously it helps [if you win] – but Inter are good.”
