Manuel Pellegrini’s Manchester City are now a point off the top of the Barclays Premier League. But the season is a marathon, not a sprint.
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Wilfried Bony, Aleksandar Kolarov, Vincent Kompany, Eliaquim Mangala and Samir Nasri are all unavailable with different injury problems.
Yet it is hard to deny they are underachieving for the quality they possess in their squad.
West Ham will not complete a double over Liverpool AND City this season, and will lose here, 2-0.
Manchester City’s Sergio Aguero (left) and West Ham’s Winston in English Premier League action at Upton Park, January 23, 2016. “In the last 10 leagues, the team who won it got over 80 points – maybe that won’t happen this time”, he said. In comparison, the two teams above them – Arsenal and Leicester City – have picked up 21 and 25 respectively.
The post again came to West Ham’s rescue in the second half with Fabian Delph rifling in a 55th-minute effort after being set up by a cute Aguero flick. Always when he comes back from injury, he needs two or three games to come back to his best performance.
“I think the pressure is part of [it] – you can not be in a big team if you don’t feel the pressure every week that you must to win the title”, Pellegrini told a news conference.
West Ham suffered a disappointing defeat last weekend, ending a run of eight games unbeaten.
“There’s always pressure in any country, but if you’re the best player in the world you can be the best anywhere”, Aguero had said a year ago.
“So I told him Manchester is ideal as a city because you stay home, you play every three days, we can eat and play football together”. “He will start working, I hope, next week, but we will see”.
“When we entered the dressing room the staff and myself we felt a little bit disappointed but that is good because it shows how well we’ve played”, he explained.
The Citizens had a tough test to deal with traveling to the Boleyn Ground to face Slaven Bilic’s West Ham United.
Manchester City striker Aguero said he had extolled the virtues of England’s northwest city to his compatriot and Barcelona forward who is the most valuable player in the game.
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“They beat us here at home earlier this season in a match I think we had 20 chances to score but we didn’t do it”. City, entering this match, have a recent record that reads thusly; loss, win, draw, win, draw, win.
