The Blues striker scored all the Blues goals in the first meeting between the sides and is well aware that if Roberto Mancini’s men repeat that triumph in Poland then qualification from Group A will be all but guaranteed.
“To be honest we are all feeling good and we are ignoring the negativity surrounding the club at the moment,” declared Adebayor.
“Losing to Wolves was disappointing, but hopefully we can all learn something from the defeat and put it to good effect against Poznan this evening.
Because we have developed a winning mentality, it makes losing matches all the harder to take
...Manu Adebayor...
“We will be doing everything we can to get back into the groove as quickly as possible.
“I don’t feel any external pressure and I’m certain most of the other players are the same. When I was at Monaco we were expected to win the title every season and at Arsenal there was pressure to win trophies each year – the same is happening here at City and so the pressure is normal and part of our professional lives.”
Adebayor is experienced enough to know, too, that a couple of defeats at this time in the Barclays Premier League season are unlikely to be fatal blows to Champions League qualifying ambitions and was at pains to put things into some kind of perspective.
“We need to keep focused, keep believing and everything will be fine,” he insisted.
“We lost at Wolves, but we are still in the running and still in fourth spot. It’s a long season and OK, Chelsea are eight points ahead of us at the moment, but Manchester United and Arsenal are in touching distance and we could be back above them in no time.
“People forget that a few weeks ago Arsenal lost at home to West Brom – we lost away to Wolves and people write us off straight away. Our profile is so high now that everyone has something to say about our club.
“We are human beings and sometimes things don’t go to plan, but I guarantee that even if we went out and signed Lionel Messi tomorrow, he would still occasionally end up on the losing side – that’s is football.”
Group A
Pos. | Team name | Pld | Pts. |
|---|---|---|---|
1 |
Manchester City FC |
3 |
7 |
2 |
KKS Lech Poznań |
3 |
4 |
3 |
Juventus |
3 |
3 |
4 |
FC Salzburg |
3 |
1 |
