Bernardo Silva believes Manchester City's next two fixtures will be crucial in determining whether they can defend their Premier League title.
Pep Guardiola's side reduced the deficit to league leaders Liverpool to three points after beating Arsenal 3-1 at the weekend, while the Reds could only muster a 1-1 draw at West Ham on Monday night.
City play Everton on Wednesday evening in a rescheduled fixture due to their participation in the EFL Cup final and will return to the top of the table for the first time since early December with a victory.
With just 13 games remaining in the current campaign, the 24-year-old stressed the need for his team to take full advantage on Wednesday.
"We have two difficult games against Everton and Chelsea which we want to win," Silva told reporters.
"If we don't, it'll start getting difficult to fight for this Premier League."
City responded to their shock 2-1 defeat at Newcastle with a comprehensive triumph against Arsenal Sunday but the Portuguese believes there is plenty of room for improvement.
"We know we have to improve... sometimes we don't play as well as we want to," he added. "We have to improve that, to see which mistakes we are making."
"The atmosphere in the dressing room is fantastic, everybody is trying to help each other.
"We want to be better players game by game, to try to be a better team and to try win some titles at the end of the season."
Additional reporting from Reuters.
