Hart rejects Kompany's absence as an excuse for City slump

Vincent Kompany's fitness woes and a lengthy injury
list cannot act as an excuse for Manchester City's 2-0
loss at Stoke, says Joe Hart.

Manchester City goalkeeper Joe Hart says his team-mates
cannot hide behind the injury absence of captain Vincent
Kompany or any other excuses after they slumped to a 2-0 loss
at Stoke City.

Marko Arnautovic gave the hosts a deserved two-goal lead after
15 minutes and England goalkeeper Hart, making his return to
action following a hamstring strain, was called upon regularly
thereafter to help keep the margin of defeat down at the
Britannia Stadium on Saturday.

City have conceded just once in the eight matches that
Kompany has started at centre-back in the Premier League this
season – Cameron Jerome's goal for Norwich City in October,
coming as a direct result of a Hart mistake – but they have been
porous without the Belgium skipper.

A fourth league loss for Manuel Pellegrini's title hopefuls this
term followed 4-1 defeats to Tottenham and Liverpool and a 2-1
reverse at home to West Ham, all matches that Kompany was
prevented from playing in due to his nagging calf complaint.

"Vincent Kompany is a massively important part of our squad
but we have a good squad here," said Hart, as quoted by BBC
Sport.

"After a 2-0 loss it is easy to say, but we will stick together as a
squad. Conditions were tough but that's English football.

"Nobody was able to walk off the pitch with an excuse, both
teams played on it and Stoke deserved to beat us. We can't
accept how we played."

City ended the game with 10 men after midfielder Fernando
suffered a hamstring injury to curtail a wretched individual
showing.

Pellegrini had Kompany, Pablo Zabaleta, Yaya Toure, Samir
Nasri and Sergio Aguero unavailable at the Britannia Stadium –
along with suspended defender Eliaquim Mangala – but again,
Hart did not cite that fact as a reason behind the loss.

"It was a disappointing start and we could not recover from it,"
he added. "We didn't play well.

"A few of the lads are feeling it from the games we are playing
but that is not an excuse.

"We need to put in at least a seven out of 10 performance every
game and we are not doing that."