Manuel Pellegrini is ignoring Jose Mourinho's attempted mind games late in the campaign. The Portuguese has consistently played down his teams chances of clinching the Premier lague title and after a shock defeat to Crystal Palace at the weekend he now has said that Chelsea have no chance.

Pellegrini told reporters "I don't think other managers can be giving any importance to those mind games," he said.

"I don't know if you think managers who play mind games are more intelligent? I don't think so.

"I don't respond to it because I don't know what he says. It's not my duty to respond to what Mourinho says. I don't know the way he thinks."

City have two games in hand on the top two and have trips to Liverpool and Everton to come in the latter stages of the season. Pellegrini said the top four all had the same chance of winning the title but his team needed to capitalise on their games in hand.

"My way of thinking is that the four teams will have the same options to win the title," he said. "Do I regret the points we dropped away from home earlier in the season? I don't think at this moment it is important. It is too far away to start thinking or talking about those games. "The other teams have 18 points more to win, six games more. We have eight games more. "We have to win those points. We don't have six points, we have two games extra to play — it's not the same thing.

"If you look at the whole season I think we are the second team in terms of points playing away. We can only influence what happens in the future."

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