Kevin De Bruyne expressed his pride after Manchester City sealed a dramatic Premier League title win on the final day of the season, highlighting how his side had to be consistently excellent in the face of Liverpool s challenge.
City went into their home contest with Aston Villa knowing a win would confirm their fourth top-flight title in five seasons, though things looked desperate for Pep Guardiola s men when Matty Cash and Philippe Coutinho gave Steven Gerrard s men a 2-0 lead.
But an Ilkay Gundogan brace, scored either side of Rodri s leveller, sparked jubilant scenes as City retained their crown despite Liverpool s 3-1 victory over Wolves, with De Bruyne providing the assist for the all-important winner.
The win marked the first time City had come from two goals down to win a Premier League game since beating Norwich City 3-2 in February 2005, while Liverpool finished second with a massive 92 points – the second-highest tally amassed by a team to not win the title after their own 97 in 2018-19.
6 Manchester City have won their sixth Premier League title, with four of those coming in the last five seasons. Crowned.
— OptaJoe (@OptaJoe)
Jurgen Klopp s side pushed City all the way after going unbeaten through their last 19 games of the season, winning 16, and De Bruyne said overcoming Liverpool s relentless challenge was a great source of pride.
It s hard because Liverpool push you that far, and you need to be excellent all the time, he told Sky Sports. There s never a moment where you can play a little bit less, losing some points means it s the end.
We feel so proud because they ve pushed us that far for years and years, but we ve still managed to find a way.
De Bruyne was named the Premier League s Player of the Season after top-scoring for Guardiola s men with 15 league goals, also adding eight assists and either scoring or laying on a goal in 14 of City s last 20 league outings.
The Belgium international also joked his cross for Gundogan s winner was his best of the campaign, as he hailed the Germany midfielder and fellow substitute Oleksandr Zinchenko for changing the game.
Asked where his assist ranked, De Bruyne replied: The best, the best, honestly!
It s not the best cross but Ilkay is there, I just wanted to put it in a place where we could score. Ilkay and Zinchenko changed the game for me.
He [Gundogan] has got a real good timing when going in front of goal, and he won us the game.
Meanwhile, just 12 minutes and 22 seconds separated Villa going 2-0 up and Gundogan completing the turnaround, and De Bruyne admitted City were beginning to panic before scoring their first.
Maybe [we panicked] a couple of times! But I think it s normal in this situation, it s so different, you can t really explain it, he added. We tried to stay as calm as possible, but sometimes there was a little bit.
2-1 just changed the whole situation, you see the whole stadium changes, the atmosphere, and we just didn t look back.
You just go for it, you re losing anyway, and you just want to change the situation, and that s what we did.
It changed quickly with the first and the second goal, I think we created more chances before that, but it is what it is.
I knew it was 1-1 at half-time [in Liverpool s clash with Wolves] but after I m not too sure – I think it was 1-1 for a long time.
Even then, I think we looked at ourselves and if you see how we tried to change the situation, we tried to force it ourselves and didn t want to look at Liverpool. Luckily, we managed it.