Manchester City captain Vincent Kompany believes Sunday’s derby with United provides them with the perfect chance to get back on track.

After winning last year’s Premier League title, the Citizens have been extremely inconsistent this season and, having looked like Chelsea’s biggest rivals for the majority of the campaign, they now find themselves sat fourth in the table.

Monday’s lacklustre defeat at Crystal Palace has inevitably led to questions about boss Manuel Pellegrini’s future, while some pundits have suggested that the club needs a huge clearout in the summer in a bid to reinvigorate the squad.

However, a victory against bitter rivals Manchester United would go some way to appeasing their critics and would also allow City to leapfrog their neighbours in the standings heading into the final few weeks of the campaign.

Kompany says the intense nature of derby matches gives his side a chance to forget their recent problems and believes a victory would go some way to affording them some sort of redemption.

“A derby is a derby,” he told the club’s website. “It doesn’t matter what place you are in the league, it’s a derby.

“If anything, it’s a good moment to go into a derby. I guess the momentum is a little bit with our neighbours at the moment, but it’s the perfect place for us to go and try to rectify what we’ve had.”

City go into Sunday’s match one point behind United in the table and are currently the slight underdogs in the betting at 2.88, with the Red Devils 2.50 and the draw available at 3.40.