Birmingham City boss Alex McLeish admits big talking from Manchester City was all the motivation his players needed.

Kolo Toure talked about how important it was not to lose against the top teams like Manchester United, as long as you beat such also-rans as Wigan, Fulham and Blues.

And Vincent Kompany wrote off McLeish's men by guaranteeing a victory and goals.

"I saw Toure's comments and I totally understand where he's coming from," said McLeish. "We had totally the same situation at Rangers and we had to beat Celtic as well.

"Winning against the smaller teams was very important if you were going to try and win a title.

"Now we know in the Premier League that the Champions League is very important, not necessarily winning the league for Manchester City at this stage of their development, and results like this can harm you.

"But there is a long, long way to go and we have already been written off. It's a season where there's plenty of points to play for, people shouldn't get paranoid about things now."