Martin Keown and Alan Shearer pulled no punches as they ripped apart the defensive performance of Manchester City in the 4-2 Premier League defeat by Southampton on Sunday.
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Manchester City manager Manuel Pellegrini insists he had no choice but to “risk” playing a weakened team ahead of their Champions League semi-final second leg against Real Madrid.
City battled for a goalless draw in last week’s first leg, denying Madrid an away goal, but Iheanacho accepts the visitors will face a tough task in midweek.
Pellegrini had praise for 19-year-old Iheanacho, who made his claim for a place in City’s team for the Madrid game by taking his tally for the season to 13 with a second successive Premier League double.
City scored 14 goals and only conceded two in their aforementioned last five Premier League matches – in fact, they have kept five clean sheets in their last eight games. I expected more – especially defending.
Striker Iheanacho, the only City player to emerge with credit after scoring twice, said: “This game is not good preparation for us”. But in this case we had to prioritise Wednesday’s game [against Real Madrid].
“Unfortunately for me, we lost today so the goals didn’t mean anything but I will keep working hard to get some more”. “But we will put it behind us and focus on the Real Madrid game”.
“I never fielded a player to please someone else – or because they had been criticized by someone else”.
“I think we’re going to come stronger in the next game”.
Manager Ronald Koeman will be reminding his players that the race for European is still mathematically on, so the South coast outfit certainly have something to play for.
Southampton were shredding Manchester City’s defense who didn’t seem to have any heart with the way they were playing.
Fourth-placed City lead Manchester United by just four points and their neighbours have a game in hand. “With these three points we are still there and we look forward to the Spurs game now”.
Pellegrini expects a far more attacking performance from Zinedine Zidane’s men, who prepared for the clash with a 1-0 win at Real Sociedad in La Liga on Saturday.
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“I’m happy for him”, Pellegrini added.
