James Milner believes Man City's trip to Liverpool provides the perfect opportunity to bounce back from their Champions League woe.
City midfielder keen to move on from Napoli woe with Anfield clash
James Milner believes Manchester City's trip to Liverpool on Sunday provides the perfect opportunity to bounce back from their UEFA Champions League disappointment.
The Premier League leaders are facing an early exit from the top table of continental football after suffering a hugely-damaging 2-1 defeat away to Napoli on Tuesday night.
Roberto Mancini's expensively-assembled squad now need to win at home to Bayern Munich in their final Group A fixture next month and need the Italians to slip up away to pointless Villarreal.
England midfielder Milner admits the Etihad Stadium outfit are on a steep learning curve in their debut Champions League campaign, but insists they will not be carrying a European hangover into their weekend test at Anfield.
Massive disappointment
"We're a strong group of players, mentally as well. We still have confidence in ourselves," Milner said. "This is a massive disappointment but it's all part of football.
"You have to deal with disappointments, move on from them and make sure you learn from your mistakes.
"That makes you a stronger and better team.
"It's a learning curve for us. We have to make sure we bounce back from this but learn from it also.
"We're disappointed but we will pick ourselves up and go again on Sunday at Anfield and make sure we bounce back with a good performance and get a win."
Big games
City could see their five-point lead trimmed to just two by the time they kick off against the Reds, with nearest challengers Manchester United hosting high-flying Newcastle on Saturday.
But the 25-year-old Milner is refusing to be distracted by their title rivals and is focused only on securing another three points in the battle for Premier League supremacy.
He added: "We're not really worried about what other teams are thinking. We've got some big games coming up and it's going to be massive on Sunday.
"That's the pleasing thing - and we've got games every few days.
"We don't have an international break to think about the defeat, we're straight back at it and hopefully we can bounce back with a victory."
