Manuel Pellegrini wants Manchester City to demonstrate the trust built by the mid-week victory against European champions Bayern Munich when they face Arsenal at the Etihad stadium on Saturday.
City rested a number of players for the Bayern match, including Sergio Aguero and Vincent Kompany and Pellegrini has left the door open for Joe Hart to potentially return to the starting line-up against the Gunners.
Arsenal currently sit six points ahead of the Sky Blues in the table with the Chilean pointing to his side’s mid-week example as how to tackle the best teams.
“The trust the team has after beating Bayern Munich in their own stadium – that is much more important than being first in the group. That is so, so important,” he said.
“This is our opportunity to take three important points against the best team in the Premier League at the moment.
“For Arsenal and for our team, this is a very important game.”
But Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger says that despite the millions spent by City in the summer he is not jealous of their rivals’ strength in depth.
“City have a very strong squad, I do not deny that. But I look at my squad and I do not envy them,” Wenger told reporters.
The 2012 Premier League champions will be without Matija Nastasic as well as Gael Clichy and Micah Richards but Stevan Jovetic, who has been plagued by injury since he joined the club in the summer, trained with the squad this week.
“We have a lot of confidence that we can change four or five players and the team stays playing the same way,” Pellegrini said.
“We are trying to find a style of play and changing names and the team plays exactly the same is very important. That for me was the most important test of the game we played against Bayern Munich.”
Image courtesy of MCFC via YouTube, with thanks.
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