City aiming to go unbeaten until end

ILKAY GUNDOGAN says Manchester City have the talent to go unbeaten from now until the end of the season.

Gundogan lines up against Borussia Monchengladbach in the first leg of the Champions League last-16 tie in Budapest tonight with City already on a 25-match unbeaten run, including 18 consecutive victories.

And while he sidestepped neatly when asked directly about the quadruple, he has no doubts about how high Pep Guardiola’s Premier League leaders could soar.

“We know what we are capable of and if we do all the things we are supposed to do, we try to take all our opponents as serious as possible and prepare ourselves as well as possible then we have a really good chance to beat every single opponent,” said Gundogan, right.

“That is our target and what we want to achieve until the end of the season. We set the bar ourselves.”

City manager Guardiola maintained they were fully focused on Monchengladbach. “We will prepare like we have done in the past few games.We have to play well but the desire is there to do what we have to do to beat them,” he said. “After that we see the second leg and then the quarters if we are good enough.There are no more expectations than that.” Guardiola has only failed to negotiate the last 16 stage once in his managerial career. But he has found disappointment easier to come by than glory since winning two of his first three attempts with Barcelona, falling at the semi-final stage five times and the quarter-final stage three times. Guardiola insisted City were the best side in the last two of those exits – against Spurs and Lyon. The Spaniard said: “We lost but we played better so this time we try to play better and win the game.”

MAN CITY (probable): Ederson; Walker, Stones, Dias, Zinchenko; Cancelo, Rodri, Gundogan; Silva, De Bruyne, Sterling.

BORUSSIA M’GLADBACH (probable): Sommer; Bensebaini, Hofmann, Elvedi, Neuhaus; Embolo, Lazaro; Wolf, Kramer, Zakaria; Stindl.