Riyad Mahrez believes a lack of clinical finishing cost Manchester City the advantage in their Champions League last-16 tie with RB Leipzig.
City travelled to Germany on Wednesday evening for the first leg against Leipzig and came back with honours even at 1-1. Mahrez opened the scoring for the away side with a composed finish on 27 minutes but the Blues failed to turn dominance into goals before Josko Gvardiol rose high to head home the leveller.
Leipzig's equaliser handed them the impetus and the Bundesliga outfit wasted their own chances to take the lead, with Andre Silva and Timo Werner both failing to score. But Mahrez believes that momentum should never have come, with City not able to capitalise on their first-half dominance.
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“I think we played a really good first half," Mahrez told City's official website. “We controlled the game. They didn’t have anything. We could have scored one or two goals. We scored and in the second half they were a bit better. But it’s the Champions League. Every team is difficult to play against.
“In the second half they had a period where they had the ball. They scored this goal but at the end we still had the chances in the second half to kill the game but we didn’t. In the end, we draw which isn’t a bad result. Now we have to go to Manchester. We have another game to play at home and we have to win.”
City welcome Leipzig to the Etihad for the return leg on March 14 for a place in the quarter-finals. Pep Guardiola is still searching for his first Champions League trophy since 2011 and the crowning glory in his spell with the Blues, with Nathan Ake admitting before the first-leg that their goal is to win every trophy possible.
"Every competition we play there's pressure, every game we have to win," Ake said. "You know, when you're at a club like Man City you want to win every trophy possible.
"That’s no different for the Champions League, we go into this game with the same mentality that we want to win this game and progress and that's our aim for the Premier League, for all the cups and it's no diff for the Champions League. Obviously we want to win it."
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