The defender is hoping that the absence of several key players will not hinder his side against Porto
Bayern Munich defender Dante believes any team in the world would miss the star names the club will be without for the first leg of their Champions League quarter-final against Porto.
The Bavarians go into Wednesday’s game with a number of key players absent through injury, including Arjen Robben, Franck Ribery, Bastian Schweinsteiger, David Alaba and Mehdi Benatia.
However, Dante believes the loss of several star names will give the chance for squad players to impress.
“They’re all unbelievably important players to us but we can only try and compensate for them as a team,” he told the Bundesliga’s official website.
“Any side in the world would miss players of such quality. Our great strength is having a squad that has both the quality and the depth to do well even with several players sidelined.”
With the Champions League final being held in Berlin a week after the DFB Pokal decider, the Brazil international is hoping to play in two showpiece events at the Olympiastadion in the space of a week.
“You don’t get to play two finals in Berlin within the space of a week very often. We’re really keen on reaching both finals, which would be fantastic.
“But we shouldn’t look to too far ahead; we should try to make the Champions League semis first.”
Though Bayern are the only German side to make it to the last eight in Europe this year, Dante feels the Bundesliga is still a very strong competition.
“We’ve been doing well in the competition for years and Dortmund have also impressed many times. To me, the Bundesliga is a very strong league as it’s difficult to win it.
“Three teams might have been knocked out of the Champions League but it doesn’t take anything away from the Bundesliga.
“Some people consider the Premier League the strongest league, but then not one English side made it to the last eight. The German, English and Spanish leagues are all on par in my view.”