Manchester City coach Manuel Pellegrini discusses his team’s performance in their UCL win against Sevilla.
Advertisement
City are on a high after beating Seville 3-1 in Spain on Tuesday night to qualify for the next round and are now favourites to win their group.
“We are not going to try to draw the game, we are going to try and win the game from the beginning”, Pellegrini said.
Sevilla had taken City all the way before losing out to Kevin de Bruyne’s stoppage-time goal when the sides met at the Etihad two weeks ago.
Before last nights game, Sevilla had won eight of their twelve home games in the Chamapions League, with no away side keeping a cleans sheet. Sevilla grew into the match as the half went on, and pulled a goal back on 25 minutes when Coke found Benoit Tremoulinas with an inviting chipped pass, before the Frenchman headed past City keeper, Joe Hart.
While progressing from the group stage has been a major hurdle for City in the past, last season they made it through only to face Barcelona in the first knock-out stage and duly made a swift exit.
City are through as neither Sevilla nor Gladbach can catch them, leaving the bottom two fighting Juve for the final qualification place, the Old Lady very much in the power position.
For City, they did not start the way they wanted to in the competition with a loss to Juventus at home, but they responded perfectly with back-to-back wins over Borussia Monchengladbach and Sevilla to sit in second place.
The Sevilla faithful also afforded a hero’s welcome to Jesus Navas as the City winger returned to his hometown club, where he spent 10 years before moving to Manchester 2013.
“We had a big man up front, a lot of runners from midfield and we hurt them like this”. “But most important for me was the way the team played tonight”. “Now we go on – we need to make sure we end as group winners”.
“There is nothing holy about the Champions League anthem”, the Belgium defender had said. “Without playing really well in the Premier League we’re top, and we’re top of our group now”.
Advertisement
“He and Sterling had a very good performance, as did all the players”. “We are looking to drive forward, play with intensity and play quickly”. “We brought the best of English football today to beat a very strong team”. “This was probably the best performance we’ve given in the Champions League so far”.
