The Premier League champions were held to a 2-2 draw by the Bees on Tuesday (14.01.25) but Foden didn't want to blame fatigue as they surrendered their advantage in the closing minutes of the game.

Speaking to TNT Sports, he said: "We just looked tired at the end, the last 20, 30 minutes. We looked leggy and they put the pressure on and put longer balls into the box.

"We didn't cope with the physicality at the end. It's one of the toughest places to come and they give you different challenges.

"I was happy with the performance up until we went 1-0 up and then after that we let our performance slip and gave the ball away.

"It's something to learn from. They gave us a challenge today and we did the best we could.

"We're used to it for many years, we've been playing the majority of the competitions and playing every three days so it's something the squad are quite used to, no excuses."

The result halted City's three-game winning run but Foden believes that City are improving following a dreadful sequence of results that saw them win once in 13 matches at the end of last year.

The England international said: "It's definitely picked up from previously and performances are a lot better than they were.

"We've still got steps to go to where we want to be but as long as we keep making small steps and improving, that's what we're aiming to do."

City manager Pep Guardiola felt that his team's poor decision-making in attacking areas was the reason they failed to win the game.

He said: "We're a bit disappointed but at 2-0 up we didn't manage to hold on to the lead and unfortunately we couldn't close the game.

"Today we didn't take the right decisions in the final third. I had the feeling that we didn't take the right decisions in the final third to close the game."