It’s been the Holy Grail for Manchester City’s Arab owners but cruelly it is only on his way out the Etihad door that Manuel Pellegrini has been able to offer progress in Europe.
While they have consistently fought for domestic honours and twice lifted the Premier League trophy, City’s failure to export their success to the continent and the desire of their owners to do business in the latter stages of the UEFA Champions League fuelled the pursuit of incoming manager Pep Guardiola.
The announcement of the Spaniard’s arrival next season has left Pellegrini a lame duck in the dugout, and while he delivered a Capital One Cup triumph, hopes of another league title have faded, leaving Europe as their only hope to retrieve something from the final months of the Chilean’s reign.
Sure, a top-four place remains on the line, with West Ham and city rivals United having the potential to deny the club a UEFA Champions League place next year, but Pellegrini will not be remembered for exiting with a fourth-place finish.
Rather, it is in this season’s competition where he can leave a legacy, and with a 3-1 first leg lead banked from their trip to Kiev last month, there should be little doubt that Pellegrini can at the very least take City to unchartered waters and a place in the quarter-finals.
“Yes of course I think we can do it,” he said ahead of tonight’s return leg in Manchester.
“Talking about my personal experience, I did it with another club Málaga and Villarreal, the quarter-finals with both clubs and one of them to the semi-final.
“It doesn’t matter against who we must play, the important thing is to be in a good moment with a good individual performance, and play as a team in the way we know how to do it. If we do it, I think we can play against all the big teams with big players.”
While this tie looks as good as won, Pellegrini’s message regarding the display is a necessary one given his squad’s remarkable rollercoaster of recent performances.
Since the win in Kiev, City have emerged from Wembley with a pot only to be hammered 3-0 by the same opposition days later. They then battered Aston Villa only to drop points to relegation-threatened Norwich.
Too often, City have looked afraid of the fight on domestic fronts, but in Europe, at least, they have shown what they are made of, coming from behind with late goals in three of the four victories that saw them top Group D.
“People have their opinions on what’s going on in terms of British teams in Europe at the moment, but we can only send the message that we’re here, we’re in it to win it and we’re going to keep fighting to the end,” goalkeeper Joe Hart said.
City were somewhat fortunate to catch Kiev coming out of an 11-week winter break, but the Ukrainians have since won both their league fixtures to shake off any rust so despite never winning in 13 games in English soil they are sure to provide more well-oiled opposition this time around.
So, with the Premier League drifting further out of sight, City will need to continue to translate Hart’s fighting words into deeds to ensure Pellegrini’s tenure ends with something more than a whimper.
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Prizes include official UEFA t-shirts and footballs to tickets to the quarter-finals, semi-finals and the final in Milan on May 28th.
