Mancini: Bridge must focus on Blues clash

ROBERTO Mancini has urged Wayne Bridge to blank out the torment that is bound to be swirling through his mind at Stamford Bridge and concentrate on helping Manchester City beat Chelsea.

“I am sorry for Wayne and for England because it is important for any player to play for the national team,” said Mancini. “He didn’t speak to me before he made the decision. I don’t know what has changed, but he has changed his decision because I thought that he would play for the national team.

“But I respect what he has done. It is not affecting the club or the dressing room. He is a strong character, who has a strong mentality. Wayne must only think about the game because it is an important match for us.”

It hardly amounts to light relief but at least the Bridge issue has taken some of the glare off Mancini, who after an initial honeymoon period is now presiding over a sequence of results that are, if anything, worse than the ones that got Mark Hughes the sack just before Christmas.

“In the last two months I have had a lot of problems,” said Mancini. “I have never had all the players.

“Carlos had to go home, and Emmanuel has been playing very well but now he can’t play for four games.

“If we had Emmanuel and Carlos together, the results would have been different.”