Thursday 25 February 2016 14:31, UK
Manchester City boss Manuel Pellegrini has called on his side to repeat their Champions League form when they face Liverpool in Sunday's Capital One Cup final.
City produced one of their performances of the season to beat Dynamo Kiev 3-1 in the Ukrainian capital and put themselves within touching distance of a place in the quarter-finals for the first time.
Now their attention turns to the Wembley showpiece, a precursor to the Premier League clash between the sides at Anfield next Wednesday.
"It is another competition now. I think it was very important to try to qualify for the next stage of the Champions League and we have made an important step here," said Pellegrini.
"Now we must try to recover the players that we have as soon as we can. We know we have a difficult game against Liverpool and I hope that by playing similar to the way we played here we can win our first title of the season."
After being thrashed 5-1 by Chelsea in the FA Cup, City took command in Kiev early on through Sergio Aguero, with David Silva doubling the lead before the break. Dynamo responded before Yaya Toure's last-minute strike sealed the win.
City have never reached the Champions League last eight, losing out at the first knockout stage to Barcelona in the past two seasons.
"We were very unlucky in both seasons to have to play the best team in the world, but this season we made the first important thing, to win the group. That was an improvement on last season," added Pellegrini.
"Now we have the chance to arrive to the next stage, the quarter-finals, when you are in the best eight teams of Europe.
"We need to play another 90 minutes at home and there are a lot of things to continue fighting for, but every year for this team it is important to improve a little bit more."
