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Pep Guadiola

MANCHESTER. — Manchester City may be on a record-breaking 18-game winning streak in the English Premier Soccer League but winger Raheem Sterling says the runaway leaders’ main focus is to continue collecting points from their upcoming matches.

The 23-year-old scored his 13th league goal to help City record a 1-0 win at Newcastle United on Wednesday night as Pep Guardiola’s side maintained their blistering run to extend their lead to 15 points over their nearest rivals Manchester United.

“I don’t think anyone is really thinking about records,” Sterling told the club’s website. “They’re nice to have on your CV but we have to keep winning and getting three points. Records only stand for a certain amount of time. Three points add to the table.”

The England international is now the league’s third leading scorer, behind Tottenham Hotspur striker Harry Kane and Liverpool’s Mohamed Salah, and has already eclipsed his 10-goal haul across all competitions last season.

“Most definitely, in terms of goals,” Sterling added when asked if he was performing at his all-time highest level. I’ve probably had a better season dribbling but this is the most efficient I’ve been… There’s no point dribbling if you’re not helping the team. Scoring is something I’ve always wanted to do and something I’m trying to improve on… I’m happy to have been able to bring that and hopefully, it will carry on.”

Meanwhile, Pep Guardiola has insisted no one can find a way to stop Manchester City. Sterling fired run-away City 15 points clear at the top. The England winger made it a stunning 18 league wins in a row for Pep Guardiola’s men.

And as City overcame Newcastle’s defensive wall, including 80 percent possession, Guardiola says they have beaten opponents playing every tactic possible. They now need a win at Crystal Palace on Sunday to equal the European major leagues’ record of 19 wins, held by Bayern Munich under Guardiola.

Sterling’s strike was City’s 102nd league goal of the year. He slid in after 31 minutes to break Newcastle’s organised resistance, with Kevin De Bruyne unlocking the defence. It was the England winger’s 17th of a remarkable individual season.

Guardiola said: “As a manager, I have to adapt my team. We have played against teams who have done high pressing, low pressing, counter attacks, just set pieces, just like Tottenham who tried to go forward and attack.

“And in all of them we have been able to beat them. The magnificent thing about football and any manager of any team is they can play anyway, teams can try to trick you , but you have to be able to beat them and until now we have been able to do that. Until now, we have found a way to win yeah.”

Guardiola says his side got over the “party” season well adding: “It’s not easy to maintain our focus in that period, everyone is on holiday, everyone has a party at home.

“To be focused after 17 games in a row is not easy but we did it. We are so happy to win again and just think about Selhurst Park now. Of course we are so happy to break records, because we keep having one more, one more, but when we prepare for games we don’t speak about records, we just speak about what we have to win. We find a way to beat them.”

It is possible only exhaustion can beat City, and they looked tired in the last 15 minutes. And Guardiola refused to be drawn into a war of words with Jose Mourinho after Manchester City maintained their impressive progress towards the Premier League title.

City stretched their commanding advantage at the top to 15 points over Manchester United as Sterling sealed a 1-0 win at Newcastle to record an 18th consecutive league victory, one short of Bayern Munich’s current best for Europe’s top five leagues of 19 straight wins.

United manager Mourinho attempted to provoke Guardiola on Tuesday after pointing to their rivals’ huge spending power by claiming “City buy full-backs for the price of strikers” and insisting that the £300 million he has spent since taking charge at Old Trafford 18 months ago as “not enough”.

Mourinho paid £93 million to sign France midfielder Paul Pogba, while also recruiting £30 million defender Eric Bailly, and midfielder Henrikh Mkhitaryan for £26.3 million. This year, United spent £75 million on striker Romelu Lukaku, as well as £31 million on defender Victor Lindelof and £40 million for midfielder Nemanja Matic.

In comparison, City bought three defenders – Kyle Walker from Tottenham for an initial £45 million, Benjamin Mendy from Monaco for £52 million and Danilo from Real Madrid for £26.5 million as part of a summer outlay that topped £200 million. When asked about the comments made by the Portuguese, Guardiola said: “I’m so delighted to be here to speak about what happened on the pitch.

“About what happened with my colleague speaking off the pitch in the press conference, I’m not the right guy. You want to talk about what happened today on the pitch, I will answer.”

City remain on course to win the title in record time after equalling Chelsea’s English top flight record of 11 consecutive away wins. But Guardiola will await medical updates on Vincent Kompany, after the injury-prone skipper limped off with a recurrence of a long-term calf problem.

City face a minimum of eight games in 34 days in a hectic start to the New Year, and Guardiola added: “Of course we are happy to break records but when we prepare for games we don’t speak about them. Until now, we have found a way to win.

“I saw the schedule in my office the other day and I wanted to escape, because it’s terrible. The games we are going to play, it’s tough. We’ve played all these games in December then in January you have the Carabao Cup and FA Cup and then the return of the Champions League in February. It will be tough but it will also be tough for our opponents.”

City next travel to 16th-placed Crystal Palace on Sunday. Guardiola’s opposite number Rafa Benitez hit back at criticism of his negative approach after his team slid to a fifth consecutive home defeat, Newcastle’s worst run at St James’ Park for 64 years to leave them just a point above the bottom three after one win in their last 11 matches.

Substitute Dwight Gayle almost snatched a dramatic late equaliser to in-part justify the manager’s ultra-cautious approach, and the Spaniard said: “We were in the game until the end and very close to getting a point against a very good team.”

Newcastle face the key visit of relegation rivals Brighton before the turn of the year, and Benitez added: “We have a couple of games in the space of a few days against teams near the bottom of the table and hopefully we’ll have some of our injured players back before then.” — Reuters