City's hopes of reaching the knockout stage are out of their hands and they will drop into the Europa League if they fail to beat Bayern Munich on Wednesday. And even if they do overcome the German giants at the Etihad Stadium, Mancini's men will still need Villarreal to take points off Napoli to progress from Group A. Mancini will not give up hope but accepts it is a long shot and is prepared to put City's maiden Champions League campaign down to experience and focus on other targets. The Italian said: "We should try to beat Bayern Munich and hope Villarreal can do a good game against Napoli. "But if we don't go through in the Champions League our lives will continue. "We will play in the Europa League and try to win the Europa League. We did our thing. We made some mistakes in this group and this can happen." City had the chance to go through a fortnight ago but Napoli seized the initiative by beating them 2-1 at the San Paolo Stadium. While City have been dominant on the domestic front, they have found elite European competition a different proposition and Mancini accepts his team need time to adapt. City may have improved rapidly in the three years since Sheikh Mansour bought the club, but they remain a work in progress. Mancini now feels he should focus on domestic competitions and hope to return for another, more concerted, shot at the Champions League next season. He said: "When we started our season the Premier League was the first target for us. I think we should be realistic in the Champions League. "There are four or five teams who are better and ready to win a Champions League. "For a team like us to play for the first year in the Champions League, it is difficult to win. "Maybe if you are lucky you can get into the quarter-finals, if you don't meet Barca or Real Madrid. "I think these two teams are better than us at the moment but we want to work. We want to arrive in one or two years at their level, if possible."
