Ilkay Gundogan sets 100-point target for Manchester City title challenge

City trailed champions Liverpool by 18 points last season

Manchester City's Ilkay Gundogan celebrates scoring with Bernardo Silva. The midfielder has set a stiff target for the coming season. Reuters

Manchester City must show more consistency this season and amass at least 100 points if they are to mount a serious challenge for the Premier League title, believes midfielder Ilkay Gundogan.

Pep Guardiola's set a Premier League record by picking up 100 points in the 2017-18 campaign and followed it up with 98 in the 2018-19 season, pipping Liverpool to the title by a single point.

They failed to match those standards last season and finished on 81 points, 18 behind Jurgen Klopp's champions.

"Last season we scored the most goals and Ederson got the Golden Glove for most clean sheets, but we still need to improve because we lost too many games," Gundogan, 29, said.

"It is impossible to win every game but what you can do is try to learn from your defeats. It is hard to rack up 100 points or 98 every single year, but if we want to be challenging for all the titles again we have to be closer to that standard.

"We shouldn't be looking to completely change the way we do things, because we have a certain way of playing that has worked well for us in the past, but there are small things we can improve on if we want a better season than last year."

City begin their Premier League campaign against Wolves on Monday.

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