Former Manchester City defender Micah Richards has warned if the club lose to Real Madrid in the Champions League semi-final their Premier League title challenge might be hampered.
City head to the Santiago Bernabeu on Wednesday evening with a slender 4-3 lead after a scintillating first leg encounter last Tuesday at the Etihad. They sit one point clear of Liverpool with four games remaining in the Premier League. Both sides have been near faultless this year - Liverpool have picked up 38 points from 14 games and are unbeaten in the league in 2022. City meanwhile have 33 points in 14 matches. Richards, who made 245 appearances for the club during a 10-year-spell from 2005 to 2015, is full of confidence in their title chances but is wary of the impact a Champions League exit could have on the squad.
“The only thing is, if Man City were to go out in the Champions League, that could knock the confidence,” he told Sky Sports after City’s 4-0 win over Leeds United on Saturday.
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“When you go into big games and you think you’re well prepared and you lose, it knocks the stuffing out of you. That’s the only thing I see hampering the rest of City’s [season].”
However if City can navigate their tie in Madrid and qualify for the final, Richards is confident of their title chances and was full of praise for both title challengers. He said: “The standards that both City and Liverpool are setting now. In my opinion, two of the best teams the Premier League have ever seen - they’ve got to keep doing that.
“You never know, the Premier League is so unpredictable. But I believe that both teams will win all their remaining fixtures, that’s how good they’ve been. There might be one slip-up or one nervy moment. After this week’s fixtures - Liverpool winning comfortably and City winning comfortably, I think they’ll win all of them.”
Between them, the Reds and City have won 51 of their 68 games and scored 170 goals and Richards believes the epic battle for the title sums up why the Premier League is so enthralling. He said: “It’s brilliant. It’s what you want to see. Leicester get it [win the league], Chelsea get it. You don’t want to see Bayern Munich winning their 10th league in a row. You don’t want that in the Premier League.”
