Manchester City midfielder Ilkay Gundogan insists last season’s disheartening Champions League exit will not provide an extra source of motivation this year.
The Premier League leaders resume their latest challenge in Europe’s elite competition as they face Borussia Monchengladbach in the first leg of their last-16 tie in Budapest on Wednesday.
City placed themselves among the favourites as they eliminated Real Madrid at the same stage last year, only to go out in disappointing fashion to Lyon in a one-legged quarter-final.
Gundogan said: “It is not something that is forgotten, to be honest, but it is not something that gives us any extra motivation.
“It is a new year, a new option, a new chance and a new challenge. We just try to do our best, as we did in the past.
“We didn’t do less in the past, we just made mistakes which led to these outcomes. Our motivation is there, as it was in the past, and we just try to do our best.”
City are 10 points clear at the top of the Premier League and still involved in two domestic cup competitions, as well as the Champions League.
Gundogan, however, is not entertaining quadruple talk.
He said at a press conference: “It is nothing that I have thought about until you just mentioned it and will not be thinking (it) in (the) next few weeks.
“If it happens I will take it but it is not something I think about.”
Manager Pep Guardiola also denied the Lyon result was a significant factor in his planning for the game.
Guardiola said at his pre-match press conference: “We played better than Lyon. We lost but we played better. We’re going to try to play better this time and win the game.
“We’re going to play this like we’ve played the last games this season, in all competitions – nothing special.
“A football game is 90 minutes. We’re going to try to win, to get a good result and then afterwards we are going to think about West Ham on Saturday.
“This is the only target. It’s the same process as I’ve said to the players for a long time – think of the next one and then, after that, the next one.”
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules here