Manchester United striker Ruud van Nistelrooy insisted his side would have no problems bouncing back from their Champions League exit against Real Madrid when they face Tottenham in the Premiership at White Hart Lane on Sunday.
Dutch forward Van Nistelrooy scored United's first in a thrilling 4-3 win over Champions League holders Real. But Alex Ferguson's men lost the quarter-final tie 6-5 on aggregate.
But despite that defeat they go into Sunday's match against Tottenham leading the Premiership by three points from Arsenal although Arsene Wenger's team do have a game in hand.
And goal machine Van Nistelrooy, who has now netted 39 times in all competitions this campaign, said: "It will be no problem lifting ourselves for the rest of the season.
"We are not feeling down because we didn't perform to our capabilities, we played the European Cup winners and beat them 4-3," the 26-year-old added as United, beaten by Liverpool in the League Cup final, battle to avoid a second successive trophyless season.
Manchester United striker Ruud van Nistelrooy would gladly trade in his glut of goals for a place in the Champions League semi-finals.
United may be Britain's top representative in Europe's premier club competition, and van Nistelrooy the competition's all-time top scorer, but the deadly Dutchman would swap the statistics for a place in the last four.
Van Nistelrooy scored his 14th goal of the campaign in the 4-3 quarter-final win over Real Madrid on Wednesday - more than any other player has managed in the competition - but even that was not enough to help United get past the European champions.
"If you score four and go out it has got to be disappointing," said van Nistelrooy. "It is disappointing not to go through after scoring five goals against Real Madrid in two games. Winning 4-3 was a good result, but it just wasn't enough.
"We never stopped trying and got a result in the end, but if we had scored our fourth, 10 or 15 minutes earlier, you never know what might have happened."
United have reached the quarter-finals seven years in succession, but have gone out at that stage four times, and van Nistelrooy added: "You are never going to win the Champions League easily, it is always hard and I think we gave our best.
"Everybody gave everything he had inside him and in that case we can look each other in the eye.
"We have a lot of good players and we can improve and there are a lot of good years ahead."
Ruud van Nistelrooy is firmly of the belief that United can get past Real Madrid and reach the Champions League semi-finals on Wednesday.
The Dutchman scored what could turn out to be a vital goal in the Bernabeu a fortnight ago, and that away strike will fill the Reds with confidence ahead of the match.
"I hope it will be an important goal," he told Manchester United Radio before the game.
"If we win 2-0 then we go through on away goals and so it will have been a massive goal. The ideal scenario is that we score quickly to get back into the game. But if that's not the case we need to be patient. We've won a lot of games late on, so we know we can do that.
"We created chances there, so if we can do that away we can do it at home."
Ruud knows exactly what the lads have to do if they are to reach the last four. It won't be easy, but the Reds aren't counting themselves out yet.
"It's a massive game and we're all looking forward to it. We've got a job to do and we know what it is. We want to win 2-0. That will be difficult as it won't be easy to stop them scoring.
"They're the best in the business if you let them play. We have to make sure their best players aren't in the game, and when we have the ball we need to pass well and create chances.
"We did better after halftime in the first game. We started playing with two upfront and four in midfield, and that put pressure on their players so they couldn't play so well."
Ruud van Nistelrooy's early strike and two more from Paul Scholes saw Manchester United beat Blackburn 3-1 to maintain their three-point lead.
Van Nistelrooy's goal had been quickly cancelled out by Henning Berg, but after Scholes had restored United's lead, David Dunn's penalty for Rovers was saved by substitute keeper Ricardo before Scholes' second goal sealed the victory.
United made three changes to the side that drew at Arsenal - John O'Shea was ruled out through injury while Roy Keane and Ole Gunnar Solskjaer started on the bench, with David Beckham restored to the starting line-up along with Quinton Fortune and Phil Neville.
Blackburn brought in former United striker Dwight Yorke for Hakan Sukur in attack.
Rovers started well and Andy Cole missed a great chance to head them in front from Vratislav Gresko's cross.
However, United took the lead against the run of play on 20 minutes when Beckham's centre was headed home at the far post by van Nistelrooy for the Dutchman's 38th goal of the season.
Rovers were level inside four minutes - Beckham gave away a free kick and when the ball was played into the area, Fabien Barthez missed it completely and Berg headed home at the far post against his former club.
Van Nistelrooy fired narrowly wide on two occasions before United regained the lead three minutes before the break - Neville's run and cross eventually fell to Scholes, who fired past Friedel.
Barthez was replaced by Ricardo at the break, and two minutes after the restart the keeper was lucky to stay on the pitch after bringing down Cole in the area - he then saved Dunn's poor spot kick to compound Rovers' sense of injustice.
Ryan Giggs missed a great chance to stretch the lead before United scored their third goal just after the hour mark - Giggs won back a ball he had initially lost and beat four men in a fine run before finding van Nistelrooy, who squared to Scholes to knock home his 19th goal of the season to end the contest.
Van Nistelrooy was denied twice by fine saves from Friedel, but United eased off towards the end with one eye already on Wednesday night's clash with Real Madrid.
Red-hot Dutch hitman Ruud van Nistelrooy believes that Manchester United have the edge in the race for the Premiership title following their 2-2 draw at Arsenal.
The 26-year-old striker opened the scoring for United at Highbury in their title showdown last night before Ryan Giggs ensured a share of the spoils after Thierry Henry's second-half brace.
And van Nistelrooy believes that Giggs' 15th goal of the season will come as a huge psychological blow to Arsene Wenger's men, who remain three points behind the Red Devils but with a game in hand.
The Dutchman said: "This is a big blow for them. Arsenal were 2-1 up and probably thinking if we can win this one then it is in our hands.
"At 2-1 down it looked like it was going to be a very hard game for us. You could feel everybody from Arsenal was going mad and crazy about taking a lead.
"It was important to hit back straight away. We reacted to it and now the race is still open. We have to do our job now in the last four matches."
Van Nistelrooy's strike, his 37th for United in all competitions this season and his first against Arsenal, gave Sir Alex Ferguson's visitors the perfect start.
And, despite Henry's double, the Dutch striker believes that the seven-times Premiership champions have produced the necessary momentum to carry them to the title.
Van Nistelrooy added: "Confidence matters so much. We have come back from so far away and caught Arsenal up. Now it is up to us if we can finish it. We feel good."
Arsenal have now won just one of their last five league matches and have seen United, who have picked up 36 points since Boxing Day, wipe out their eight-point advantage, carving out a three-point lead of their own.
WE WILL BOUNCE BACK - RUUD
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