OWEN Coyle refused to criticise Jussi Jaaskelainen for the blunder which set Manchester City on the road to victory yesterday.

The Wanderers keeper looked set to make a routine save from David Silva’s shot when the ball bounced past him into the net.

The 26th-minute mistake was a major turning point in a roller-coaster game in which City dominated in quality and chances and Wanderers refused to lie down and die.

Zat Knight was unusually beaten for strength and aggression by Edin Dzeko before the striker blasted home City’s third and, as it turned out, winning goal.

Coyle accepted mistakes were made, and admitted that was his biggest disappointment with his side’s otherwise impressive performance.

“Accepting that we were playing against an elite club, a club that has vast amounts of wealth and have assembled a terrific team, my disappointment is that we gave them one or two of the goals,” he said.

“If somebody is going to beat you then let them go and earn it.”

But, while he was left ruing those crucial moments, he would not allow individual players to come under the microscope of criticism for the errors.

He said: “If there were mistakes made then they were not made by anybody on purpose “And if they made a mistake they will have been made by the same players who have been outstanding and won us games.

“So we don’t apportion blame to anybody because our strength is as a group. If there are mistake made that is part and parcel of the game.

“But those lads will be the same people who will win us games.

“If somebody has not been at their best then we will pick them up and we will go again, and stick together as we always do.”

Coyle hailed his side’s battling spirit, but accentuated the point that it went hand in hand with footballing quality.

At no point did Wanderers abandon an adventurous approach, even when City twice built up two-goal leads.

And the Reebok boss stressed that the Whites will always have a go at opponents, no matter how good they are.

“With this group of players it is always a given that we will show fight,” he said.

“But they did more than that, they showed a lot of great quality on the ball as well.

“It would have been very easy in that game at 2-0 and 3-1 down to feel sorry for ourselves and come under the cosh.

“But we stuck together valiantly and scored two outstanding goals with terrific finishes and produced a lot of good play.”