A loss, at the Etihad Stadium has seen us fall seven points behind Manchester City in second place, whilst also allowing the chasing pack to close on us.
Indeed, if Spurs win at West Ham this evening, we`ll fall to fourth place with Arsenal eyeing up that spot as we face a hard batch of fixtures.
Following the defeat, Rafa Benitez had this to say about the performance, commenting,
‘When you lose, you have to be disappointed and this game was important for us because we could have been closer to Man City, but we cannot give up.’
‘We have to fight for the top four because Arsenal, Tottenham and Everton are close behind.
Indeed they are. And as for the penalty and the referee`s refusal to give Joe Hart even a yellow card, Rafa bleated,
‘I haven’t seen the replay, but at least yellow card. You can argue he is going in this direction but it is still a clear chance. I think it was a turning point. We didn’t do well in the first half but we went to half-time at 0-0.’
‘We were talking about keeping the ball, doing better and showing more character. Then we had the penalty. It was a crucial moment in the game.’
Indeed it was, but we should have had the testicular fortitude to bounce back should we not!
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