Diego Simeone hopes Atletico Madrid can continue their excellent recent form to clinch a top-eight spot in the Champions League, but he remains wary of the challenges ahead.
Atletico won a 10th game in succession as they eased past Slovan Bratislava 3-1 at home on Wednesday, a result that leaves them one point outside the top eight with games against Bayer Leverkusen and RB Salzburg still to come.
It is Atletico's longest winning run in over a decade, since winning 13 in a row between August and October 2012.
"There are two games left, and they are very good teams," Simeone said. "We face Leverkusen, one of the best in the competition, and we will see how far we can go.
"We will give our maximum and see what the sum of our points brings us."
Julian Alvarez and Antoine Griezmann, who scored a double, eased Atletico to victory against Slovan, though Simeone was left to rue a conceded penalty that briefly sent jitters through his side as the visitors made it 2-1.
"The effort was there," he said of Wednesday's performance. "The first half was controlled, with important chances, and then in the second, it was also controlled beyond that penalty.
"The players managed it well, and we won a game in which we cared a lot about the three points."
Atletico have been magnificent on their 10-game winning run, scoring 30 goals in that streak, effectively putting their sluggish start to the campaign behind them.
"It's football and football turns, changes, with moments of difficulty and others that lead you to be very good. We know what we have [in the team], where we are going, and we always try to improve."
Wednesday's match was notable for the fact that at one stage both coaches had their sons on the pitch. Giuliano Simeone started for Atletico, while Slovan coach Vladimir Weiss brought on his son, also Vladimir, for the final six minutes.
"I think that if the coach [Weiss] has chosen to put the player on, he did not think of putting his son on. Like me, neither of us have looked at them as a son, we look at them as footballers," Simeone added.
Among teams who have scored 100+ goals in the Champions League, only Lionel Messi (20.4% for Barcelona) has scored a higher percentage of a club's goals in the competition than Griezmann has for Atletico (19% - 36/189).
All of his Champions League goals for the Rojiblancos have come under Simeone. Only Messi under Pep Guardiola (43) and Mohamed Salah under Jurgen Klopp (41) have scored more goals under the same manager in the competition.
"The Champions League is complicated, goals matter a lot," Griezmann said. "It is a shame about the penalty. In the second half, we let them have the ball a lot. These are things to improve as always, but we are on the right track."