Pellegrini wary of Spurs threat

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Manuel Pellegrini has warned that Manchester City will be facing a different Tottenham to the side who rolled over twice against the Premier League champions last season.
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Manuel Pellegrini has described Manchester City's new multi-million pound training complex as the 'best in the world'
Manuel Pellegrini has described Manchester City's new multi-million pound training complex as the 'best in the world'

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City triumphed 6-0 at home and 5-1 at White Hart Lane against Spurs in the last campaign but they have made a promising start under Mauricio Pochettino.

Pellegrini said he has admired Pochettino as an adversary both when the Argentinian was at Espanyol and at Southampton, and that he did not expect Tottenham to collapse so easily in the lunchtime kick-off on Saturday.

Pellegrini told a news conference: "Yes I am sure it is a different Tottenham.

"Last year one of the best games that we played was against Tottenham away. Here also we played very well but we are not expecting that we can score six or five goals every time we play Tottenham.

"They are a very strong team. Mauricio Pochettino is a very good manager. I'm not saying Villas-Boas wasn't in that moment, but really we played our best last season. We hope on Saturday we can do a very good game also.

"He (Pochettino) is a young manager that was very successful in Spain with Espanyol, it was a team that always played good and attractive football and it was a creative team.

"He is trying the same way he did it last season at Southampton. That was a team that played very well, he continues now at Tottenham that is an important club with big players."

Pellegrini said Yaya Toure was in contention for a place despite playing for the Ivory Coast in a 4-3 home defeat against DR Congo on Wednesday, with the midfielder returning to Manchester on Thursday.