Vincent Kompany frustrated by injury recurrence

In between those two openings, though, they nearly conceded a fourth goal, with Silva making a 30-yard forward burst before driving a shot just wide.

Kompany cited the incident as “a bad day” for himself personally, but vowed to overcome the challenge put ahead of him that he describes as more frustrating than ‘any of the big injuries I’ve had’.

Pellegrini rued the injury to the Belgian, saying after the game: “Vincent is not the best news”. They visit surprise title challengers Leicester on Tuesday.

Manchester City suffered a massive blow in the race for the title as Vincent Kompany had to come off nine minutes into the game against Sunderland on 26 December. But it is the knockout stages of the Champions League – City play Dynamo Kiev in the last 16 on February 24 and March 15 – that will be circled on his desk diary with Kompany’s recovery in mind. “They have got to release themselves from the fear they are showing”.

“We’ve played the whole season with an average of six players injured in every game”, said Pellegrini, referring to the long injury list he has had to deal with this season.

Manchester City proved too strong for Sunderland, as they romped to a 4-1 win at the Etihad on Saturday evening.

“He’s very important because first of all he is captain”, Pellegrini said. And, this season, his reliability. “Then we think about Leicester. We lost important points against Arsenal -a game of six points – but it was not a decisive game as I said before the match”. But I am not happy because we came here to try to win the game.

And there was more worry for City when Kompany, who had earlier replaced Nicolas Otamendi, limped off to be replaced by Martin Demichelis. A De Bruyne free kick was met by the head of Bony who found the bottom corner.

The defender himself insisted his body feels “invincible” but is “challenged by a number of small and local injuries”.

“I’m fine for the moment”, he added after scoring his 10th goal for City. The £54m outlay for him was huge, but seems justified. The Citizens have not been playing to the best of their abilities but the game against Sunderland could prove to be a turning point for the Manchester club.

Fabio Borini did muster up a consolation for the Black Cats just before the hour – having done exactly the same in their defeat to Chelsea last week – but it meant little to nothing, even with Bony missing from the spot shortly after. “A central defender would be the first priority”, he said.

He would now be looking to buy centre-halves and he would probably be shopping overseas. “It will be very hard to secure a player from another Premier League club”.

None of this matter in the end though, City cruising to victory as Sunderland remain in the drop zone – seven points from safety with plenty to ponder. Allardyce argued that everyone has had an opportunity. “I can moan about them more than they can moan about me”.