Manuel Pellegrini reflected on what has been a ‘difficult’ week for his City side, as they conceded their first Premier League goals in 572 minutes in a 2-1 defeat to West Ham.
Victor Moses and Diafra Sakho’s first half strikes meant that City had conceded as many goals in 45 minutes as they had in their previous nine league home games.
Kevin De Bruyne pulled one back for City before half-time, but Pellegrini was left frustrated as City suffered their first defeat of the Premier League Season.
“It’s been a difficult week,” said the Chilean.
“We never believed after five games we are champions, there are 96 points to play for.
“This is football and you need to score to win. We conceded two easy goals in the first half – one shot at the edge of the box and one corner.
“We must be more concentrated. We know [West Ham] are dangerous at set-pieces. We knew they have good players who have good shots at the edge of the box.”
The defeat came despite Manchester City’s domination of the game, registering more attempts, possession and touches in the opposition area than they have in any game this season.
The hosts had 72.3% possession, the average position of eight of their players after 90 minutes was in the West Ham half, and just 13.7% of the game was played in City’s final third.
However West Ham stood firm, as Adrian pulled off eight saves, and centre-back Winston Reid made 20 clearances – more than any player has made in a Premier League fixture this season.
Pellegrini was not interested in excuses however, as he also refused to blame his side’s injuries for the defeat.
“One thing I never do is to have an excuse about players that cannot play,” he said.
“We had players that could play and those players know the way they must play.
“They are good players, I have a strong squad and because David and Kompany could not play we cannot have excuses that we have lost to West Ham at home.”
City will hope that these injuries are not long-term problems however, as they look forward to getting their search for glory back on the road against Sunderland on Tuesday in the Capital One Cup.
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