DERBY DEFEAT BLESSING IN DE-SGUISE

KEVIN DE BRUYNE claims Manchester City’s derby defeat could help their pursuit of glory this season.

City saw their 21-game winning streak and 28-game unbeaten run ended with Sunday’s 2-0 defeat at home to local rivals United.

Despite losing, Pep Guardiola’s side still hold an 11-point lead over United at the top of the table with 10 matches to go and remain on course for an unprecedented Quadruple.

City are in the Carabao Cup final, the FA Cup quarter-finals and lead

Borussia Monchengladbach 2-0 after a first-leg away win in their Champions League last 16 tie.

Although disappointed with the end of their epic run, midfielder De Bruyne (right) said the United loss may end up being a positive, allowing City to refocus as the season enters the home straight.

“Obviously it’s not nice to lose the derby,” said the Belgian, 29. “But sometimes it’s necessary to have hard games and even lose games. You learn a lot about these moments and now we have to recover and work hard again to be ready for Wednesday.

“The gap is there but we have to focus on Southampton.

“It doesn’t matter how big the gap is as we always want to win the next game.

“That’s on Wednesday against Southampton and we have to be ready for it.

“We play game by game, we don’t think about the winning streak or what’s going to happen in four or five matches ahead. We need to pick ourselves up because we have another important match on Wednesday.

“We’re going to try to do our job and win again.”

City know victory over Saints tomorrow will extend their lead over United and take them a step closer to winning a third league title in four years.

“We move on,” said De Bruyne. “Wednesday is a new game and we’ll focus on that. We have confidence that in the next game we’ll put the missed chances in.”

BRIGHTON have suffered a major blow in their fight to escape relegation from the Premier League with Tariq Lamptey now set to miss the rest of the season.

The former Chelsea defender had surgery at the weekend on the hamstring problem which has kept him out since the middle of December.

The England Under-21 star, who Ghana want to represent them at senior level, is recovering from the surgery.

But Lamptey is now expected to miss Albion’s final 11 games of the season, which start with a trip to South Coast rivals Southampton on Sunday.

Lamptey signed a new five-year deal in January.

Albion have lost their last three games and are now lying outside the drop zone ahead of Fulham only on goal difference.