Martin Demichelis says Manchester City will stick to the plan when the injury-hit side entertain Swansea City in the Premier League tomorrow.
The Swans are flying high in fifth place, just three points behind City, and they head to the Etihad looking to better the 3-0 defeat they suffered there last season.
City are set to be without the injured Edin Dzeko, David Silva and Aleksandar Kolarov but defender Demichelis is confident so long as they follow Manuel Pellegrini’s orders.
“I think that Manuel always wants us to win in a certain way, but what we need to do is win consecutive games to reduce the gap with Chelsea,” Demichelis told the club’s website.
“We have to beat Swansea and hopefully we can beat them by playing in the style that has served us so well. We need to win games while we fix things and find our best form again.”
City currently sit eight points behind Chelsea but will welcome back Frank Lampard while Vincent Kompany has been passed fit after sitting out of Belgium’s games last week.
“The title race is a long way from being over. All teams have difficult moments during the season,” Demichelis added.
“Chelsea will not win all their games so we have to pressure them. We have to win games so they will feel that someone is chasing them.
“We have the squad to do it, even if we have some injuries at the moment. We will continue fighting for the title to the last game to try to be champions again.”
Boss Pellegrini echoed the defender’s belief that Chelsea can be caught and has cited the Christmas period as a vital time in the title race.
Pellegrini told the press conference: “When mathematics say you can do it, I think that all the teams can do it.
“We are going to play eight Premier League games to finish the first half of the season at the end of December. We have 24 more points to try to win between now and then.
“While we do not have to be at the top of the table by the end of the year, I think to make sure we have had a good first half to the season we need to have more than 41 or 42 points.”
The Chilean’s target means he is looking for his side to clinch at least seven wins from eight, while Champions League survival is another concern with Bayern Munich on Tuesday.
“We are not thinking about Europe. We are thinking about the Premier League,” he added.
“We must try to cut the points we are behind the leaders. It is very important to win against Swansea then when we have finished the game we will start to think about Bayern.”
Main image courtesy of Alex Morton via Action Images, with thanks.
