Kevin de Bruyne: Team is still motivated to keep on winning

The Belgian midfielder is optimistic to win the league although insists that it will go until the final match similar to the previous season.

Kevin de Bruyne expects yet another close Premier League title challenge with Manchester City and Liverpool fighting right till the very end for the coveted trophy. As of now, both Liverpool and City have played 11 matches but Pep Guardiola’s side is separated from the table-toppers by six points. Leicester City and Chelsea are a point ahead of City but it remains to be seen whether they manage to sustain this level of performance to tee off the blue side of Manchester. Meanwhile, Kevin de Bruyne weighed upon this topic as he said, “It’s been first against second for the last few years and we have been duelling with them to win the league. This year I don’t see it being any different. There are some other teams with us but obviously Liverpool are the biggest threat. If they were to win, then the gap is big, but it’s not season-defining.” [KH_ADWORDS type="3" align="center"][/KH_ADWORDS] “There’s no way the season would be over, there’s still so many games after with a lot of points to play for, but obviously if you have a nine-point gap then they’d be very happy and for us there would be more pressure. We just have to do what we do; do our jobs and we all want to win,” the player told Mancity.com. Guardiola’s team has been on an incessant surge and drive towards domestic success to the point where it becomes surreal that how they have managed to keep this level of consistency over the past few years in terms of their gameplay and performances. Regarding this, the Belgian remarked, “Motivation comes from yourself. A lot of teams have a problem with it. When you win one year, maybe you do a little bit less because you think ‘it’s okay we won last year’, but we showed last year that we would do everything to compete to be at the level to win the league back-to-back in a way that hasn’t happened for a long time." “That’s hard, but the team is still motivated to keep on winning. You have to bring it out of yourself; it’s not for the manager to say let’s go to win; it’s the team and the players.You know how much work, dedication and focus you have to bring into this to be ready to do it again and I think the team is doing well in that aspect." “We lost some points in the first few months, but that happens, we still do the same and at the end of the year if we do what we did in previous years but don’t win it then we can still be happy with what we did off the pitch, on the training ground and this is a really important aspect too.” [KH_RELATED_NEWS title="Related News | ARTICLE CONTINUES BELOW"][/KH_RELATED_NEWS] De Bruyne had to spend time on the sidelines due to his injury troubles last season but that is not the case this time around. He has played 786 minutes in the league and tops the assists chart with nine of them to his name. He was asked about his personal run of form to which he replied, “I’m happy that I’m back playing, back fit and that I’m helping my team. This is my main focus. I’m never too concerned about how many assists or goals I can get because I’m a midfield player whose role changes all the time.” “Last month I played more defensively because the team needed me to because we have a lot of injuries so I’m helping my team. People these days think statistics is the most important thing, but I just need to help my team keep winning.” Manchester City face Liverpool tonight at Anfield, in a game that could potentially turn out to be extremely crucial as in terms of the current dynamics of the league table as we move ahead in the season.