Roberto Mancini hails Manchester City's David Silva as world class• Manager puts Spaniard on par with Xavi and Iniesta
• Feels Barça and Real Madrid should have signed midfielder
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reddit this Press Association guardian.co.uk, Monday 12 September 2011 13.01 BST Article history
Manchester City's David Silva is as good as Barcelona's Xavi, his manager Roberto Mancini has said. Photograph: Andrew Boyers/Action Images
Roberto Mancini has paid tribute to David Silva, describing him as one of the world's best players – and is grateful that Spain's loss is Manchester City's gain.
The City manager is baffled that Barcelona and Real Madrid overlooked the midfielder, signed from Valencia in 2009, who has played a dominant role in the club's victorious start to the season.
"Silva is a top, top player," said Mancini. "I don't know why he didn't go to Barça or Real Madrid because he's Spanish but we are lucky because he's here. If he had gone to Barça two years ago everyone would say he's one of the best players in the world – and he is one of the best players in the world.
"He's different from [Lionel] Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo because they are strikers and score a lot of goals but I think he's the same as Xavi and [Andrés] Iniesta."
City will make their Champions League debut on Wednesday when Napoli visit Manchester, and Mancini will hope to reap the dividends of a rotation policy that is one of the benefits of his large squad.
Mancini admits the players may not be happy to be rested or start on the bench – for example Edin Dzeko did not play a minute of City's 3-0 win over Wigan Athletic at the weekend despite scoring four goals in the previous match.
Mancini said: "They may not be happy – that's impossible because every player wants to play always, but I'm the manager and I need to take this decision. Now we have a difficult match coming up, we play every three days and these players like Edin, [Aleksander] Kolarov, [Stefan] Savic, [Samir] Nasri have played two games in four days and they need to recover.
"We have a long year and I need all the players to be available as much as possible and sometimes it's better that they rest. We have the first game in the Champions League for the club, it will be an exciting night but we need to have a focus and make sure we beat them."
Mancini accepts that Serie A is behind the Premier League in terms of quality but insists City should not think they can stroll to victory against the Italian side, who were from the pot of fourth seeds in last month's draw but have a pedigree in the competition going back to the days when Diego Maradona captained the side.
"I think at this moment Serie A is behind the Premier League but in the Champions League it's different," he said. "For Napoli it will be the first time in the European Cup after many years, after Maradona, and for them, like us, the first night will be very exciting.
"They are a very good team and the Champions League is not like the Premier League, we only have six games and you need to win always if you want to go in the second stage.
"It's strange because our group is a very hard group and all the teams can finish top or in fourth position."
City of course, have the Maradona connection too now – Sergio Agüero, who has already scored six goals this season, is his son-in-law.
"I don't know if Maradona will support Naples or City – he will have mixed feelings," said Mancini.
_________________ "It felt like a really pointless version of ketamine: no psychedelic effects, no pleasant slide into rubbery nonsense, just a sudden drop off the cliff of wrongness." "i'm gonna wreck you so bad we're going to have to change church"
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