Manchester City midfielder Kevin De Bruyne has admitted he would rather win the Premier League again over the Champions League if he can only get his hands on one trophy this season.
City have dominated in England in recent seasons, winning three of the last four titles and are favourites to make it four from five this year despite a recent dip in form and surge from Liverpool.
But the Champions League is the one major trophy that has continued to elude De Bruyne and City, with their best performance in the competition coming last season when they were losing finalists.
De Bruyne is keen to win every trophy possible, yet insists his legacy won’t be tainted if he never wins the Champions League. He also values the Premier League title more because of the greater effort that has to go into winning it over nearly three times as many games.
“If I have to choose, I would go for the Premier League. It shows the consistency of a player and what you have to do across a whole season,” the Belgian explained ahead of this weekend’s Manchester derby clash at the Etihad Stadium.
“In the Champions League, you need to be good but at certain times it's more of a lottery compared with the league, which has more games. Would my personal achievements be bigger if maybe for instance we won the Champions League last year? For me, as a player, no.”
“There are legends of the game who haven't won a Champions League. At the end of my career, I won't be looking back at what I haven't achieved. I know you want to win a lot, but one more trophy doesn't define what you did in your career.”
De Bruyne even added that he thinks it is 'good to have moments that hurt’ when looking back on a career because winning everything all the time doesn’t reflect the challenges of real life.
“That's not how it works,” he said.
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Source : 90min