VMC's Some Might Say: Pretty, Pretty Good

City bounced back from that last seconds defeat in the Manchester derby by serving up some fine football in the defeat of Newcastle. Post match reaction from St James Park...

This was Roberto Mancini's 95th win across three years as City manager. He's drawn 35 times and lost 35 matches out of a total of 165. Pretty, pretty good...

Roberto Mancini:
'The performance against Manchester United was fantastic. We were disappointed for the result and finish. Today it was difficult because clearly after the defeat against United you need to restart quickly. We had a difficult game against Newcastle but I think the guys were really, really good. All the players played very well...if not it would have been difficult to beat Newcastle 3-1, and I think it could have been six or seven because we missed a lot of chances to score.

'At 2-1, when you are missing three or four chances like we did in the first half, if they had scored they would have opened the game. But after that we were strong because we scored another goal and we had our chance.

'Tevez and Aguero are perfect because they play very well together but we have Edin Dzeko also and when he came in today he was important because he kept the ball - it was important.

'Balotelli was at home because he needs to work. If he deserves to play it is because he works well. If not he can stay on the bench like all the other players.'

Yaya Toure:
'It was tough. After the derby loss at home we needed to respond today. Newcastle is a good team with a fantastic manager but I think today we deserved to win because we played well and it's hard to play here...The most important thing is the three points and we have to keep going.'

Kolo Toure:
'When you come to Newcastle you need to be tough mentally. It does not matter what has happened, they just keep going and they have great fans that were all over us. We showed great character.'

Alan Pardew:
'Fair play to the champions, they played well. You're going to have problems against Man City. My goodness they've got some great players and conjured up some great moves today. Their best players played well. Yaya Toure and Tevez up front were a real handful...I was proud of my players second half. I thought we really came out with intent, didn't let the second goal knock us into negativity so there's a lot to lean on going into QPR.

'We've had some problems but it's about the next game in this business and the next game is QPR at home. We're going to be under pressure to win it but we're in good shape to do so I think because we gave a good account of ourselves. We are in a dogfight down there now.'

CITY ON TWATTER:

Vincent Kompany:
'Great performance from the team! Well done boys! #MCFC'

Sergio Aguero:
'Important victory of @MCFC - with excellent displays of football. The goal? Dedicated to @DaiDelCas. Happy bday, sis!'

Pablo Zabaleta:
'Great performance , great result. Always at Newcastle is a very tough game. Well done boys. Come on City!!!!'

UPCOMING FIXTURES:
all times East Manchester

Sa 22Dec 15h00 Reading, The Etihad, PL
We 26Dec 15h00 Sunderland, Stadium of Light, PL
Sa 29Dec 15h00 Norwich, Carrow Road, PL
Tu 01Jan 15h00 Stoke, The Etihad, PL
Sa 05 Jan 15h00 Watford, The Etihad, FAC
Su 13Jan 16h00 Arsenal, The Emirates, PL
Sa 19Jan 15h00 Fulham, The Etihad, PL
Tu 29Jan 19h45 QPR, Loftus Road, PL

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