Kyle Walker says Manchester City have the characters and ability to end poor run
Manchester City captain Kyle Walker is confident the champions will soon bounce back from their alarming slump.
City’s recent blip threatened to become a crisis as they crashed to a fifth successive defeat with a startling 4-0 home thrashing by Tottenham on Saturday.
It is the club’s worst sequence since 2006 and, with three of the defeats having come in the Premier League, damaging to their hopes of winning a fifth successive title.
Walker expects City to start putting things right as they host Feyenoord in the Champions League on Tuesday before a potentially critical trip to leaders Liverpool next weekend.
“We’re going through a bad spell but we will come out the end of it,” said the England right-back.
“We’ve got the characters and more than enough ability in there to do so. We won’t give up. We’ve all achieved a lot for this club.
“It’s a new season and we need to go and fight for the Premier League again.
“We’ve got a game on Tuesday, we just need to get one win and hopefully we get our mojo back.
“Do I think we’ve lost confidence? No, I think it’s stupid for us to say that. We just need to start winning again.”
City had started brightly against Spurs, seemingly energised by news of manager Pep Guardiola’s new contract extension and a pre-match celebration of Rodri’s Ballon d’Or win.
Yet they are now badly missing the injured Rodri’s presence on the pitch, as the team capitulated after James Maddison had scored the first of a quickfire birthday double on 13 minutes.
Pedro Porro and Brennan Johnson also got on the scoresheet in the second half as City’s 52-game unbeaten run at the Etihad Stadium was shattered by the Londoners.
Walker, a former Spurs player, said: “It’s first attack, first goal; second attack, second goal. It knocks the wind out of your sails.
“I thought we had chances as well, but they finished theirs and we didn’t take ours. It’s little details that amount up to big problems.
“We all take accountability for this, and we have to turn it around as soon as possible. It’s football, we can’t feel sorry for ourselves – we have to dig deep now and look forward to the game on Tuesday.
“It’s time to show the character and we will keep fighting as we always have done, right until the end.”
Maddison stole City’s show to launch his own party on the day of his 28th birthday.
His display more than justified his recall to the side by manager Ange Postecoglou after a spell out of favour, although he insisted he was not playing with a point to prove.
Maddison, whose total game time in the previous two Premier League fixtures amounted to just 14 minutes, said: “I wouldn’t say that was the correct wording. You have a point to prove in every game that you play, that is the mindset that you’ve got to have.
“I’ll just make sure that whenever I get the chance he can’t leave me out. No player is happy not to play.”
Sourse: breakingnews.ie