Kev: We must beat top four more often
KEVIN de Bruyne says City need to be winning games against their top four rivals more often if they want to challenge for the Premier League title.
The Belgian played upfront as the Blues were without Covid-hit Gabriel Jesus and Ferran Torres at Stamford Bridge, while Sergio Aguero was only fit enough for the bench.
But he was in superb form, scoring and also setting up Phil Foden as City raced into a 3-0 half-time lead with a ruthless display in the first 45 minutes.
The win lifted the Blues up to fifth, four points behind leaders Liverpool with a game in hand. But De Bruyne says City now need to be winning big games if they have any chance of winning the league.
“It’s important that we win one of these big games,” he said as City won just their fifth match against last season’s top six since the start of 2019/20, with one coming against a Liverpool side who had already won the league.
He continued: “The last year, especially this year, we’ve played some good games but not won one of them. Here we showed we can win the big games. We’re still fighting an uphill battle, but we’re coming closer and that’s the only thing we can do right now.
“The years we were champions we were winning these big games. It’s a little bit different this year with everybody losing points and you see we had the bad start, but we’re coming a bit back because we won a couple of games. It’s good we’re here fighting and that’s the only thing we can do right now.”
De Bruyne explained how Pep Guardiola had asked him to play in an unfamiliar central role with Torres and Jesus both isolating, and how the new tactical approach helped City score three times in 16 first-half minutes.
He explained: “It was a bit bizarre in the beginning, I’ve done it a couple of times in my career. Obviously there’s a lot of strikers, forward players who are out.
“The coach asked me to do this job and I tried to do it the best as possible and it’s good that we won in this way.
“After five or ten minutes we found our rhythm. The beginning was looking for myself a little different role, after that we played very well, we took our chances at right time.
“Defensively we were solid for about 90 minutes, it’s a shame they got the goal in last minute. But we were standing really well defensively the whole game.
“We have different players, so we play a little bit different this year and we adjust to the personnel we have.
“The team is finding our rhythm in the last month so we’re playing better and the difference today when we have the chance we took them.
“That makes a difference leading 3-0 at half-time and you can play more realistic in the second half and that’s what we did.”
Now, De Bruyne challenged his team-mates to continue their good form and approach every game with the same attitude that characterised the win at Chelsea.
“I don’t have an explanation, it is what it is,” he said of this season’s unpredictability in the top flight.
“All the teams, every game we play you don’t say there will be an easy game, it doesn’t happen this year, that’s not the feeling.
“Every game you have to be 100 per cent, if you’re only at 95 you’re not going to win them and that’s what happened to all the teams this year. You need to go on a run of winning games.”