Manchester City rallied to claim a 3-2 victory on the night

The Blues paid the price for a poor first-half showing on Thursday, with Sporting Lisbon able to snatch two priceless away goals. Roberto Mancini refused to point the finger of blame at his players after seeing Manchester City bow out of the Europa League at the last-16 stage. City rallied to claim a 3-2 victory on the night, but it was not enough to see them into the quarter-finals. 

"It is not his fault that we lost this game. I am the manager and it is my fault, not Mario's fault. The players did everything on the pitch." Mancini was at a loss to explain City's slow start, with a disjointed showing in Portugal having forced them to enter the second leg playing catch-up. 

He said: "The first half was very strange. We left a lot of space for them to counter attack. We didn't play as a team in the first half." "I am disappointed because there were mistakes. I feel sorry for our supporters because they deserved to go to the next stage." "I was disappointed with him because he conceded the free-kick," the Italian told ESPN. 

Asked why City left themselves so exposed to counter-attacks, Mancini added: "We expected this, but we were too long with the players, with the defenders too long from the midfielders, from the wingers. Mancini conceded afterwards that he must shoulder responsibility for the exit, despite admitting to being disappointed at Mario Balotelli for conceding a needless free-kick that led to Sporting's opener. 

"We didn't do a good job in the first half, we conceded two goals. The second half changed everything, we scored three goals and had chances to score a fourth goal." Mancini's half-time team talk brought the desired response from his players and City must now take that form with them into their Premier League title challenge. Pressed on what he had said at the interval, the City coach added: "I said to go and attack. It is football and you never say never. Anything can happen and we scored two goals in 20 minutes. The second half was fantastic.