City’s aces trail 2-0 from the trip to Ukraine a week ago, but the Blues manager refuses to give up on a quarter-final place despite the growing pressure on his hard-pressed and injury-reduced squad.
He said: “I don’t think that we should start the game trying to score, score, score - I think that we should play our game and not concede a goal. This is very important.
“We can score two or three goals at any moment. It’s not important to score after five minutes or half an hour. It’s important we play as a team, very strong. Dynamo Kiev will play on the counter-attack and we need to pay attention.
“It’s important that our supporters will be very close with us, like they were in the Reading game. After that we can play our game. I don’t think we have to score after one minute ... we just have to play our game.”
City’s boss will also be relieved to see the international break offer some of his players a breather following Sunday’s Barclays Premier League showdown with champions Chelsea, not least workaholic skipper Carlos Tevez.
Captain Fantastic, who has not been selected for Argentina’s squad, has hit a dry scoring spell, with just one goal in his last nine City appearances after firing 20 in his previous 26 games.
Mancini said: “I think Tevez, like the other players, needs to work in the next week because in the last 45 days it was impossible for us to work, and when you can’t work, it’s difficult.
“It isn’t only Carlos whose sharpness has suffered, all the players have. Because if we had 20 or 23 players when we play four or five games in two weeks, we would be able to change six players every game.
“We don’t have that option and when you can’t train it’s difficult to keep the same level for one month or 45 days. That’s the same for all the players, not only Carlos.”
