Manchester City manager Manuel Pellegrini claims captain Vincent Kompany wasn't dropped last night.

The Belgium defender was only on the bench for their 2-0 win over Leicester in the Premier League.

Kompany's form has been widely criticised recently, but Pellegrini said he needed to rotate his line-up.

Strong management by Pellegrini to bench Kompany

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"For the same reason that was Pablo Zabaleta, Vincent Kompany, Fernandinho, Samir Nasri, Edin Dzeko - that they weren't playing normally," said Pellegrini

"Because I think that it was important to refresh the team mentality and physically after we play two difficult games physically but we didn't have the score that we want," he added of back-to-back 2-1 defeats by both Liverpool and Barcelona.

"It was a good moment to refresh the team."

With regard to Kompany's reaction when hearing of his demotion, Pellegrini said that the 28-year-old took it, "very, very well - without any problem".