Aguero twice comes to Man City’s rescue for draw at West Ham

“It is very hard to play like he did today on a weekly basis but he’s played like that since the beginning of the season”, Bilic said.

Momentarily there was confusion if the goal counted but it was a relief to Manuel Pellegrini and the entire Manchester City supporters as the score read 2-2. Both teams will be looking to leapfrog the ones above them on the league table with a win in this match, and this is a crucial mid-season clash for them.

Especially when he can dig them out of trouble like he did against West Ham.

City’s knockout encounter against Dynamo Kiev on February 24 will be at least their 40th of the campaign and Bilic said: “If they go out I do not think it will be about them dropping their level or quality but the demands of the Premier League”.

Manchester City’s Sergio Aguero and West Ham United’s Winston Reid (left) and Mark Noble (right) battle for the ball…

However, West Ham restored their lead two minutes later, as Valencia out-muscled Nicolas Otamendi, before poking the ball beyond Hart, 2-1. West Ham’s French magician opened his box of party tricks and outshone City’s galaxy of stars. So I need all our players in their top performance as many games as we can.

Manuel Pellegrini has challenged him to play in all of City’s remaining matches as they fight on four fronts for silverware. But while Bilic believes Pellegrini has at his disposal the greatest squad in the land, he is hopeful West Ham can continue their impressive record against the established big teams this season.

City earned a hard-fought draw against West Ham at the Boleyn Ground and the Citizens could have easily come away with nothing from the clash as the Hammers were arguably the better team on the day. When we entered the dressing room at full time we were disappointed but that is a good thing. If you look at the whole game we had two or three clear chances to score and win the game.

“(In recent games) he was making the movements that show us he will be there soon”, added the Chilean. It was good for the fans that it was live on television and it was brilliant for the neutrals. West Ham come into this game as he form team even though they lost to Newcastle last time out, before that loss West Ham had not tasted defeat in their previous nine games.

The City boss said: “I hope now that he is 100 per cent fit and he does not have any problem and it is very important that the team plays with him in every game”.