• Manchester City manager says title decider is nothing personal
• Mancini appointed after City sacked QPR manager Hughes
Roberto Mancini insists Manchester City's title decider against Queens Park Rangers on Sunday is not a personal battle between him and Mark Hughes.
Hughes, who was sacked prior to Mancini's arrival at City in December 2009, takes QPR to the Etihad Stadium needing points to be sure of avoiding relegation.
Depriving City of victory could also deny them the Premier League title but while some have suggested that might give Hughes double reason for motivation, Mancini claims the teams are all that matter.
He said: "This is not important – on Sunday we play Manchester City against QPR. For me, they are a good team, they don't deserve to stay at the bottom. They want to do everything to stay in the Premier League and for this reason I think it will be a tough game.
"I don't know him [Hughes] very well but it is not Mancini against Hughes or Hughes against Mancini. It is City against QPR. One team plays for the title, the other plays [to avoid] relegation."
City lead the table on goal difference from Manchester United heading into the final fixture and need only to match their rivals' result to claim a first title in 44 years.
Mancini accepts there may be nerves in the final hours before the game but says there has been no tension in training. "It is a normal week, without problem, without injury. We have worked well. We need to play another difficult game. We need only to have focus about the game."
Hughes's adviser Kia Joorabchian has denied claims by several newspapers that the manager will receive a £1m bonus for keeping QPR up.
Joorabchian said Hughes is at the club for the long haul. "He knew he was taking the job in the middle of the season, quite late on in January," Joorabchian told Sky Sports News. "The directive of the owners and the chief executive was that they wanted to build the club from the base up and they were looking for the right man to do it.
"If it meant it would take a few years to build it then that's how it was and that was the whole thing of signing [Hughes] in that there was no bonus at all for him or his team for staying up." Read More
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