Hughes: We are not in a relegation battle.

svennis pennis

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Manchester City boss Mark Hughes vehemently denied his side are facing a relegation battle after they could only manage a 1-1 draw with Fulham at Craven Cottage. Benjani gave the visitors an early lead but Jimmy Bullard's equaliser means Hughes' outfit have only won two of their last ten league games.Despite having the financial backing of the Abu Dhabi United Group for Investment and Development, City have just 18 points from 16 games and were a perilous three points above the relegation zone before the rest of Saturday's games.

But Hughes isn't worried and says City will improve significantly in the second-half of the season.

"No, we're not in a relegation battle," said Hughes in his post-match press conference. "We're down there but we've got quality that's not available.

"We need to pick up points sooner rather than later but we're looking upwards not downwards.

"We've got a lot of players out at the moment but once we get everybody back we'll hopefully we'll be stronger in the second half of the season, which all my teams are historically.

"We just need to get a few bodies back and make sure the games we have coming up, which are winnable, we get points on the board."

And Hughes said he would definitely look to spend in the January transfer market - although he called the speculation over his potential targets as 'hysterical and ludicrous' after City were linked with a £129m bid for Real Madrid goalkeeper Iker Casillas last week.

"It's a little bit hysterical and ludicrous at the moment to be perfectly honest," explained the former Blackburn boss.

"When we go to the market, we'll discuss players with the clubs direct and if we can do some business, if we generate the resources to do that and if we can bring in a bit of quality to the club then that's what we'll try to do.

"I don't think there'll be many clubs spending a great deal in January so maybe it's competitive advantage that we have in this window.

"But clubs can refuse to release players we covet so it's not an exact science. There are a lot of boxes that need to be ticked to bring players through the door."

Until we get said players back, we are in a relegation battle. Clubs with more points than us have said they are in a battle so why arent we.

I am encouraged by his transfer comments though. I understand he has to be cautious but id like to think privately he is really going to go for it.

Had to laugh at the tit on sunday supplement this morning who said we should just stick with what we have got. Why is that? so we stay away from the top 4?
 
Jeez this guy takes the biscuit i know he is fighting to keep his job but to say we are not in the relegation fight is just plain stupid. Ok we are technically 4 points from the bottom 3 because of our goal difference but i'm sure you'll all agree the prospect of losing just 1 game and others winning 1 will bring us level on points with third bottom :( if this happens who knows how low we could actually fall and what effect this will have on the players.

I wonder when MH will wake up and have to guts to walk away and give us a chance to turn round the mess he has created, but i wont hold my breath as he will proberly wait to be sacked. I'm predicting we will actually see the likes of Robinho, Jo, Richards and SWP all looking to abandon the sinking ship MH has created at our club.
 
To be honest I don't see us getting involved in a relegation battle but it was the quote in the Sunday Times that got me

"It was not a game we expected to win"

Really? Talk about aiming high and the 'winning mentality'

I expected the game to be hard. I don't anticipate us winning every game. But I do expect the manager to lead us into games such as this with an expectation of winning the bloody thing. How on earth this is expected to inspire the players is beyond me.

The warm embrace of mediocrity is still providing comfort for MCFC
 
How can it be called a relegation battle less than halfway into the season?

If we are still in 13th with 10 games left, then I would say its a 'battle', right now everybody is just jostling for position. Its a fooking marathon, not a sprint.
 
RobsondeSouza said:
Jeez this guy takes the biscuit i know he is fighting to keep his job but to say we are not in the relegation fight is just plain stupid. Ok we are technically 4 points from the bottom 3 because of our goal difference but i'm sure you'll all agree the prospect of losing just 1 game and others winning 1 will bring us level on points with third bottom :( if this happens who knows how low we could actually fall and what effect this will have on the players.

I wonder when MH will wake up and have to guts to walk away and give us a chance to turn round the mess he has created, but i wont hold my breath as he will proberly wait to be sacked. I'm predicting we will actually see the likes of Robinho, Jo, Richards and SWP all looking to abandon the sinking ship MH has created at our club.

I find it interesting that your focus is on 'within two weeks we could be in the relegation zone' rather than that in two weeks we could be 7th.
 
BobKowalski said:
To be honest I don't see us getting involved in a relegation battle but it was the quote in the Sunday Times that got me

"It was not a game we expected to win"

He said that?

Fuck me.
 

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