Tottenham Hotspur 3-1 Manchester City

MANCHESTER City manager Roberto Mancini says his side are not inferior to Manchester United despite a 3-1 defeat at Tottenham Hotspur which gives their rivals the chance to clinch their 20th league title with four games to spare.

Tottenham Hotspur's Welsh midfielder Gareth Bale (R) scores their third goal past Manchester City's English goalkeeper Joe Hart (2nd L) during the English Premier League football match between Tottenham Hotspur and Manchester City at White Hart Lane in north London on April 21, 2013. AFP PHOTO / IAN KINGTON RESTRICTED TO EDITORIAL USE. No use with unauthorized audio, video, data, fixture lists, club/league logos or “live” services. Online in-match use limited to 45 images, no video emulation. No use in betting, games or single club/league/player publicationsIAN KINGTON/AFP/Getty Images

Scorers: Tottenham Hotspur - Dempsey (75), Defoe (79), Bale (82); Manchester City - Nasri (5)

Referee: L Mason

Attendance: 36,121

Victory for United at home to Aston Villa tonight would put Sir Alex Ferguson’s side 16 points clear of City – a huge margin compared to last season’s title race that went down to the last kick of the season.

“It’s over. It was over three or four weeks ago,” said Mancini after Tottenham hit back with three goals in seven minutes through Clint Dempsey, Jermain Defoe and Gareth Bale to defeat last season’s champions. “But (United) are not better than us. They deserve to win the title because we lost a lot of points in games we didn’t deserve to lose but United have scored more goals.

“But 13 or 15 points, however many it is, is not true. It’s not the reality for this championship.

“We wanted to win the championship but we didn’t. We have to give congratulations to them but we don’t have a gap to make up. In the last two or three years when we’ve played them we’ve always been better than them, even when we’ve lost the game.

“This year we were better but lost in the last minute and last year we beat them easy; every time we’ve played them in the last two or three years we’ve not had any problems.”

Asked if United’s players had shown a better attitude throughout the season, Mancini did not disagree. “Yeah, yeah, probably because they lost the championship last year. They improved the team in the summer and scored a lot of goals. They conceded a lot too, but scored more which is important.

“I think we probably deserve to have more points today but that doesn’t change anything.”

After the high of a first English title since 1968 last season, this campaign has been something of a letdown for City who were knocked out of the Champions League in the group stage and have been unable to match United’s consistency. They do have an FA Cup final to look forward to, against Wigan Athletic on 11 May, but Mancini said he was disappointed.

“I’m not happy because I like to win the championship because that was the target at the start of the season, I always want the maximum. We can still win the FA Cup and that’s important, as is second position.

Meanwhile, Tottenham’s Champions League hopes received a huge shot in the arm after they staged a stunning comeback after their visitors took an early lead.

With just over four minutes on the clock, Carlos Tevez stretched the Spurs back four and picked out James Milner, who fed Samir Nasri and he slotted home with a cushioned volley.

Tottenham’s push for an equaliser looked destined for failure until the 75th minute. City backed off Gareth Bale and he whipped a low teasing cross which Clint Dempsey converted from close range.

Spurs then threw everything at City, and the tactic paid off when substitute Jermain Defoe, who had been on the pitch for just seven minutes, latched on to Lewis Holtby’s through ball and curled a brilliant shot past Hart.

A carnival atmosphere broke out inside White Hart Lane and the roof nearly came off moments later when Bale killed the game off by lifting the ball over Hart after a brilliant through ball by Tom Huddlestone.

Tottenham: Lloris, Vertonghen, Dawson, Walker, Assou-Ekotto, Dempsey, Parker (Huddlestone 61), Bale, Sigurdsson (Holtby 60), Adebayor (Defoe 71), Dembele.

Manchester City: Hart, Kompany, Zabaleta, Clichy (Lescott 90) Nastasic, Milner (Kolarov), Nasri, Barry, Y Toure, Dzeko (Sinclair 83), Tevez.