Irish Sunday Mirror

Pain of losing to Jose

- BY SIMON MULLOCK

FERNANDINH­O insists that Manchester City did not pay the price for taking United for granted last season. City had the chance to win the title against the Reds at the Etihad – and led 2-0 at half-time, only for Jose Mourinho’s (left) United to score three second-half goals to win 3-2. Pep Guardiola’s stars had walked on to the pitch with their children before the game, in a mood of celebratio­n.

But Fernandinh­o said: “We didn’t treat it like a party. In previous games, we took our kids on the pitch, so we didn’t do anything different.

“What happened is that we scored two goals and we missed a lot of chances to score more. United came back well to win – that can happen in football against good teams.

“We lacked concentrat­ion at set-pieces and we didn’t cover in the best way possible.

“Pep was angry, but we all were angry. Very angry.”

He added: “We were only beaten twice in the Premier League last season – and it hurt that we lost to United.”

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