Elite ‘wary’ of us now says Kevin
KEVIN DE BRUYNE believes Manchester City have the rest of Europe running scared after their performance against Shakhtar Donetsk on Tuesday.
City put down a Champions League marker with their comprehensive 3-0 victory to overtake Lyon at the top of Group F.
City manager Pep Guardiola said before the game his side were not “special” enough to go all the way and lift the trophy.
But De Bruyne does not follow that rhetoric and instead believes his Premier League champions are playing better than ever – and that their biggest European rivals should be worried about facing them in the knockout phase.
The likes of Real Madrid, Barcelona and Juventus still stand between City and their first Champions League crown but De Bruyne said: “They are all wary of us.
“We lost against Lyon, so it was important to recover and now we want to be first in the group. There are still three games to go and we have work to do.
“Last year was so good it’s hard to say that we are better but the beginning to this season has been really good. We’re doing well.
“Obviously most of the victories were games that we should have won, but we’ve done really well.
“We only lost the Lyon game [2-1 at the Etihad on September 19] so we’ve been fine but, to be honest, I didn’t expect anything less.
“Shakhtar are a team who like to play football so when we pressed them high it worked well for us.
“We should have scored more but to go away from there with a 3-0 victory is good.”
De Bruyne’s team-mate and fellow midfielder Fernandinho agreed but believes his side still have much room for improvement.
“I think it’s important the team operates as a whole, not just the defenders but the attacking players as well. When they start to press so high, they make it difficult for the opponent to make chances and get the ball to the midfielders,” he said.
“When the ball gets to our box it is a little bit easier for our defenders and the keeper as well.
“The general concept is we are in good shape and everybody now understands what we have to do.
“We just have to improve it more to get better.”
City travel to title rivals Tottenham on Monday evening, when the state of the pitch could be an issue because Spurs’ temporary Wembley home has been hosting NFL games.
De Bruyne is hoping the surface will not disrupt City’s free-flowing passing style and said: “We have played on NFL pitches before in pre-season and it’s not nice.
“I’m not sure how difficult it’s going to be. We hope it will be OK and we can play like we normally do.
“These games are the most important ones. It’s a big game.
“We have to go and show our intent to stay on the top.
“They will try to do the same because they
are close to us.”