Not even 48 hours have passed since the final whistle blew at the Etihad Stadium on Saturday afternoon but talk has now firmly switched to Tuesday’s clash with Bayern Munich.
Normally on a Monday morning we’d be bringing you even more reaction from a crucial Premier League victory, but today it’s all about the next one.
Still, after the long international break I’m certainly not complaining about another City fix!
So let’s get straight down to business and start with the MEN’s report on one Samir Nasri, who Stuart Brennan believes can hold the key to seeing off the German Champions.
The Frenchman was spectacular on Saturday, and was voted Man of the Match at the Etihad by you – now Brennan has challenged him to show his ability and leadership on the European stage.
Writes Brennan: “He fitted snugly into Pellegrini’s attacking philosophy and was a key man in the title win.
“But he has the capacity to be THE man. Nasri can run games, as he did on Saturday, taking a hold of a match that was in danger of yet again slipping away from City.
“When Bayern Munich come to town tomorrow night, Silva and the suspended Toure will both be absent, and that means Nasri is the man to whom the Blues will look to unhinge the European champions.
“If he can mastermind City’s attack in the way he did against the enterprising Swans, he can start to establish himself as one of Europe’s top players – he really does have that amount of ability.
“Sometimes you need pure football leadership, someone brave enough to get on the ball, use it well and try the unorthodox, at a time when lesser men are wont to hide.
“Nasri was that man on Saturday. Whenever City got near the Swansea box, he was demanding the ball, popping up in dangerous areas, making light of tight marking and always seeking a chink of daylight in a defence reinforced by the knowledge of their one-goal lead.
“The equalising goal, which arrived a merciful ten minutes after City had gone behind, owed plenty to Nasri.”
Nice to have you back, Samir!
Elsewhere, and Manuel Pellegrini has also been looking ahead to Tuesday’s vital fixture – and as you might expect, his words are dominating the headlines across printed and online media this morning.
The Chilean insists he’s thinking positive about the Champions League and City's chances of progression, and has confidence his team can do the business against Bayern.
Pellegrini is quoted in the Telegraph as saying: “As a team, we never think chances are gone – in the Premier League and Champions League.
But maybe we are in a difficult position. If we don’t play a good game against Bayern Munich, of course, we cannot continue in the Champions League. But I have trust in these players and I am sure we are going to play a good game and win the three points.”
He added: “We have two games more and the target is to qualify for the next stage. A lot of time, the teams who have played badly in the group have won the Champions League.
“We have made important mistakes – especially against CSKA Moscow, but it is important now to put on a good performance. If we don’t continue, then it is an important step back, but we have had chances already. I always think in a positive way and the only thing we need to do is to win.”
That’s certainly all we can do, and if City can do it at the Allianz, why not the Etihad, eh?!
One person who certainly agrees with that way of thinking is Stevan Jovetic, who believes City have got their confidence back ahead of the game it seems everyone is talking about.
The striker has fond memories of his performance against Bayern with Fiorentina, and reckons injuries can also hand City an advantage.
Jovetic told the Daily Mirror: “Bayern are a good team, but I played against them with Fiorentina a couple of years ago and played well
“They also have a lot of injuries. If we want to get to the next round we have to win games and I hope on Tuesday that will be the day.
“Everything is confidence. When you are a striker, scoring brings confidence, and for a team, winning brings confidence.
“We won an important game against an important team like Swansea, and that alone gives us confidence.
“Every player wants to put their stamp on every game, but that is especially so in the bigger games, like this one against Bayern.
“I saw a different City from the last couple of games. We were better and had at least 10 chances to score.”
Hear, hear!
I can feel the positivity in the (dressing) room.
Frank Lampard is lethal, one of a dying breed of goalscoring midfielders... that's why Manchester City love him so much
Frank Lampard should start against Bayern Munich on Tuesday for City
For a 36-year-old who was supposed to be seeing out his professional career in the relative calm of Major League Soccer, Frank Lampard is hardly going quietly.
He is expected to start what could well be Manchester City’s last throw of the dice in the Champions League against Bayern Munich on Tuesday and the club are now talking about keeping him almost until the first kick of the MLS season in March.
Surprise is being expressed at the lengths Manchester City are prepared to go to. There is now talk of New York City, Lampard’s American employers, holding their pre-season training camp in Manchester to enable him to remain in the Premier League for longer. Friendly matches could also be arranged in the north west, so that he might be accessible to both clubs.
In his first four appearances for Manchester City, Lampard had scored four times
Manchester City say Lampard’s pre-season needs are moot, anyway. Having played the first half of the Premier League season, at his age he simply couldn’t undergo the physical strain of intense preparation.
Better to keep ticking over, with light training and match practice. It is the logical argument and City believe they will win it.
Even so, it seems a frightful palaver to accommodate a player who was bought as little more than a stop-gap, has started only three games this season and completed one — against Sheffield Wednesday in the Capital One Cup.
The broader explanation is that Yaya Toure will miss most of January and maybe even half of February at the Africa Cup of Nations.
City cannot afford to have Lampard depart on January 1, too.
Yet there may be more to it than that. In his nine games this season, Lampard has scored four goals.
He is joint-second highest scorer at the club, with Toure and Edin Dzeko, and has scored more times than Stevan Jovetic or David Silva.
Jesus Navas last scored a Premier League goal on January 18. Samir Nasri is yet to score in any competition this season.
Lampard, even in his dotage, remains prolific. Going into this weekend, to have just three Premier League goals would put a player joint 19th in the scoring charts.
Lampard is a goal off that pace, having started two Premier League matches this season, one of which ended through injury after 28 minutes.
He has matched Toure for goals, having started three games to Toure’s 17.
His old club, Chelsea, are being hurried towards the title by the prolific Diego Costa, yet have not replaced Lampard. They never will replace Lampard, because what he brought was unique in the modern age.
Eden Hazard is their highest-scoring midfielder this season: he has four Premier League goals, one more than Oscar. Willian and Cesc Fabregas have one each.
Lampard at Chelsea would have been hugely disappointed with any of those numbers. He was in double figures in 10 consecutive league seasons. In all competitions over five seasons, between 2005-06 and 2009-10, he scored 108 times.
So where have the goalscoring midfielders gone? Going into Sunday's games there were 38 players with three goals or more in the Premier League — and only 12 were midfield players.
Of that number, only Nacer Chadli of Tottenham Hotspur (six) and Mohamed Diame of Hull City (four) had more than three goals. And only four of the 38 were old-fashioned box-to-box central midfielders in Lampard’s mould.
Chadli is at times used almost as a second striker. So are players like Juan Mata, Oscar or Raheem Sterling. Hazard, Nathan Dyer and Angel di Maria are very much forwards, too, starting wide.
Like tackling and full backs who see defence as a priority, the Lampard role is a diminishing art. In the Premier League this season, only Diame, Crystal Palace’s Mile Jedinak and Southampton pair Morgan Schneiderlin and Victor Wanyama have had any return from that position.
A look at the numbers in the England squad underlines the dearth of options. Roy Hodgson’s current central midfield pairing, Jack Wilshere and Jordan Henderson, have 44 caps between them — and no goals.
Chelsea legend Lampard netted 211 times in his 13 years at Stamford Bridge, a club record
James Milner has scored once in 53 games. Wide players Sterling, Adam Lallana and Stewart Downing have no goals in 61 appearances combined. Promote Michael Carrick, Tom Cleverley and Fabian Delph and that total would not increase.
In the most recently named squad, aside from Milner’s one, only Theo Walcott (five) and Alex Oxlade- Chamberlain (four) had scored an international goal.
So why do City want to keep hold of Lampard? It is not just to shadow Toure. Perhaps Manuel Pellegrini has come to realise that he has an unlikely opportunity to work with the last of his kind in the English game.
City came to Lampard late — but no wonder they wish to savour every moment of his autumn years.
Pep Guardiola should come and manage in England one day, says Manuel Pellegrini
Manuel Pellegrini and Pep Guardiola will clash again on Tuesday
Guardiola has 18 months left on his contract at Bayern Munich and has long been linked with a move to the Premier League
If Manchester City lose to Bayern they will be out of the Champions League
Manchester City manager Manuel Pellegrini has said it would be 'very good' for Champions League rival Pep Guardiola to manage one day in the Premier League.
Pellegrini faces Guardiola on Tuesday night with the Bayern Munich manager tipped in some quarters to be his eventual successor at The Etihad due to his previous working relationship at Barcelona with City executives Ferran Soriano and Txiki Begiristain
Far from baulking at the mention of Guardiola's name, Pellegrini has heaped praise on his counterpart and said he could see the benefits for the Bayern boss of working in England at some point.
Pep Guardiola showed the full range of his emotions as Bayern Munich beat Hoffenheim 4-0 on Saturday
'I cannot read what will happen in the future but I am sure if sometime he arrives here, he will be a very important manager as he was in Barcelona and now at Bayern Munich. But it is impossible for me to know,' said Pellegrini.
Asked if he though Guardiola would come to the Premier League, the City boss replied: 'Maybe, yes. I think it will be very good for him and very good for the Premier League also. But I cannot talk for Pep Guardiola.
'I think Pep always gives a style of play to all his teams. Maybe the players are not the same so Barcelona and Bayern Munich do not play exactly the same. But they are always very attractive teams and very offensive teams that likes to have high possession of the ball.
'I think that Pep is a very good manager, he demonstrated what he did in Barcelona and now at Bayern Munich but I think the most important thing for us is to try to make a very good game against a great team.'
Guardiola's contract in Germany has another 18 months to run and he is likely to be coveted by every major team in Europe afterwards, including Arsenal and Manchester United if they have vacancies.
Tuesday night represents a huge match for Pellegrini who was hired to replace Roberto Mancini in 2013 partly due to his success in taking unfashionable Malaga to the last eight of the Champions League.
Ironically the Chilean's greatest success at City so far has come in domestic competitions, winning the Premier League and Capital One Cup last season.
City crashed out in the last-16 of the competition last season and have collected only two points from four games in their group games in this campaign.
Defeat against Bayern will end their Champions League hopes and Pellegrini says he is putting more pressure on himself than the owners are applying to avoid that happening.
'My own pressure to continue to the next round is an important pressure – more maybe than the owners,' he said.
'Of course I think we must be in the next stage. A lot of times you don’t reach the target you are supposed to do but that is the way to sit down and think about what happened. I repeat, I will do that after we know if we are not in the next stage.
'If we don’t continue to the round of 16 then of course it is a step back but we have to play two more games and we will see what happens in those games. After that I can answer, not at this moment.'
Pellegrini's hopes aren't helped by missing Yaya Toure and Fernandinho on Tuesday due to their red cards against CSKA Moscow in their previous European games. David Silva, Aleksandr Kolarov and Edin Dzeko are also currently injured.
In addition, the City boss has been hamstrung by Uefa restrictions on squad size and spending power due to the club breaching financial fair play regulations.
It led to Pellegrini allowing striker Alvaro Negredo out on loan.
'We had a lot of restrictions, we cannot have more than 21 players in the Champions League squad. It is a lot of things but it is not my way to use all these things to excuse bad results. We have a squad, we have the reality of what happened this year and have to work that way.'
Bayern have already qualified for the knockout stages and are favourites with Barcelona and Real Madrid to the win the Champions League, boasting star names like Arjen Robben, Franck Ribery, Robert Lewandowski and World Cup winners Mario Goetze, Manuel Neuer and Thomas Muller. Captain Philippe Lahm is out though with a long-term injury.
Manuel Pellegrini urges Manchester City fans to roar his charges on against Bayern Munich
City could be eliminated from the Champions League if they lose at the Etihad, after failing to win in the competition so far
Manuel Pellegrini has urged Manchester City’s fans to turn up the noise for Tuesday’s crunch Champions League tie at home to Bayern Munich.
City’s fans have been strangely subdued at the Etihad Stadium in City’s two group games there this season, a 1-1 draw with Roma and a 2-1 defeat to CSKA Moscow.
The Premier League champions, on just two points from their four Group E games, need to beat Bayern to ensure their destiny remains in their hands ahead of their final game away to Roma.
And City boss Pellegrini has urged City’s fans to raise the roof against Germany champions and five-times European Cup winners Bayern, to give his players the backing they need.
“Maybe in the last game against CSKA Moscow they were not so noisy as they are in the Premier League,” said Pellegrini.
“But I’m sure on Tuesday we’ll see the real fans here supporting our team and that they will be very important for us to try to win.”
City are without suspended duo Yaya Toure and Fernandinho, while David Silva, Aleksandar Kolarov and Edin Dzeko are all sidelined through injury.
The absence of Dzeko means Stevan Jovetic, who scored in City’s 2-1 win over Swansea on Saturday, will keep his place up front with Sergio Aguero, with Frank Lampard and Fernando set to occupy the central midfield roles.
Manchester City apologise after certificate featuring Ched Evans photo is given to kids
Manchester City has issued an apology after a certificate which featured a photo of convicted rapist and former Sheffield United footballer Evans was given to children.
The Sun reported yesterday that the certificate was given to attendees of Academy coaching sessions, featuring images of successful footballers who had been in the programme.
Ched Evans was one such footballer, having been at Manchester City for eight years before he moved to Sheffield United.
A spokeswoman for Manchester City has said that the club apologised for any distress caused.
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"It is some years since these certificates were updated and they were part of an old batch which were mistakenly distributed and which will not be distributed again.
"The club has been preparing new and updated Academy-related materials for some time and, once completed, it is these materials that will be presented at future events.
"We thank the parent involved for bringing this matter to our attention."
Last week, Sheffield United decided to no longer let former Welsh international Evans train at the club, after UK-wide opposition which led to the resignation of four patrons.
Manchester United may seek to swap 25-year-old midfielder Ander Herrera, their £29m summer signing from Athletic Bilbao, for Bayern Munich's Xherdan Shaqiri, 23. (Bild)
United are unsure about exercising the purchase option on Radamel Falcao due to the 28-year-old Colombian striker's lingering injury concerns, while fellow striker Robin van Persie, 31, could also be leaving the Red Devils this summer. (Le Figaro)
Arsenal are showing interest in Basel centre-half Fabian Schar, 22, and could make a move for him in January. (Daily Star)
Manchester United and Arsenal are competing for the £12m signature of 20-year-old Hull left back Andy Robertson, who cost the Tigers just £2.85m from Dundee United in the summer. (Daily Express)
Everton manager Roberto Martinez wants to sign Wigan midfielder Shaun Maloney, 31, who he managed during his time as boss of the Latics. (DSSC)
Liverpool midfielder Lucas Leiva, 27, could leave Anfield to join up with former Reds boss Rafa Benitez at Napoli in January. (Daily Star)
Inter Milan striker Mauro Icardi, 21, dubbed the new "Ronaldo", is being linked with a £28m summer move to Liverpool or Chelsea. (Daily Express)
Liverpool are planning for life after Brendan Rodgers after lining up Borussia Dortmund coach Jurgen Klopp as his potential replacement. (Daily Express)
And Rodgers admits his position is under threat after his side's poor start to the season. (Daily Mirror)
Meanwhile, Liverpool striker Mario Balotelli, 24, has given himself a rating of seven out of 10 for this season, despite not yet scoring a league goal, because he believes he is running more than when he played for Manchester City. (Fox Sports Australia)
Chelsea boss Jose Mourinho says their impressive start reminds him of the season his Real Madrid side clocked up 100 points. (Daily Mirror)
Former Barcelona goalkeeper Victor Valdes, 32, is unlikely to be fit enough to play for new club Manchester United until December at the earliest. (Daily Star)
Hull manager Steve Bruce fears the integrity of the Premier League is being ruined by player behaviour - claiming his midfielder Gaston Ramirez was sent off during Sunday's 2-1 home defeat against Tottenham because of centre-back Jan Vertonghen's melodramatic reaction. (Times)
Former England captain Alan Shearer says Arsenal are "a soft touch" and claims "this could be the year they finally lose their Champions League place." (Sun )
Everton's Romelu Lukaku, 21, has the potential to be the best striker in the world, says manager Roberto Martinez. (Liverpool Echo)
On-loan midfielder Niko Kranjcar, 30, plans to earn a permanent move to QPR, despite having not started any of their last six games. (Daily Mirror)
Former Manchester United boss David Moyes said of his opening game as Real Sociedad manager - a goalless draw at Deportivo La Coruna: "I really enjoyed it. It is quite a British stadium. The facilities were quite similar. Then there was the rain, the game itself, a few tackles flying in. It could have been a game in England." (Times)
Newcastle boss Alan Pardew admits his squad is stronger than he first thought. (Newcastle Chronicle)
Swedish defender Pierre Bengtsson, 26, is leaving FC Copenhagen to join Mainz on a two-year contract. (L'Equipe)
Borussia Dortmund are chasing Dinamo Zagreb's 22-year-old Croatian midfielder Marcelo Brozovic, who has also been linked with AC Milan and Arsenal. (Bild)
Bayern Munich have already signed a two-and-a-half-year contract with Real Madrid's 27-year-old German midfielder Sami Khedira. (L'Equipe)
Inter Milan have joined a long list of Italian teams interested in Marseille forward Andre-Pierre Gignac, 28. (Le Figaro)
Arsenal forward Lukas Podolski has posted a video of himself hurling a basketball through a hoop at a funfair, along with the message: "He shoots... He scores! I can find the net no matter what the sport."
We know how Manchester United midfielder Michael Carrick spent his Sunday afternoon, tweeting: "Quiet finish to F1, glad the double points didn't play a part in deciding the champ. Lewis Hamilton has been immense since Spa. Congrats."
QPR defender Rio Ferdinand also enjoyed the Grand Prix, posting: "Well happy for Lewis Hamilton. Aggressive and efficient sportsman. Nico Rosberg showed admirable class in defeat. I'm a terrible loser."
Harry Kane showed his delight after Tottenham's late show at Hull. "Buzzing with that comeback. Once again we showed great spirit. Need to build some momentum now. Fans were different class," he tweeted.
Burnley defender Michael Duff turned his hand to social comment on Twitter, posting: "Seriously who votes for Stevi on X-Factor 2014. In fact come to think of it, who votes at all?"
David Moyes' first match in charge of Real Sociedad may have been a 'great experience', but the Scot may want to forget the wardrobe malfunction that went with it - after he split his trousers on his debut. (Metro)
An Arsenal supporter has been arrested after red wine was thrown at the Manchester United bench during Saturday's Premier League match. (Guardian)
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