He’s Carloss

NIGEL DE JONG says the new slim Carlos Tevez is tum-thing special.

Manchester City midfield ace De Jong revealed Tevez returned from his summer hols 15lbs lighter.

And he has produced some FLABULOUS form as a result.

Tevez has been worth his weight in goals with three in as many matches.

Team-mates at the Etihad have noticed he has lost his belly and hope he can become a lean mean scoring machine this season.

His late Sunday equaliser at Liverpool was his 100th goal in English football.

Dutch hardman De Jong said: “Carlos looks slim now. He had a little belly but that’s gone.

“It’s always hard to get him off the ball but I’d rather have a slim Tevez than one with a belly.
“But as long as he keeps scoring, it’s OK.”

Tevez, 28, has battled to keep the pounds off throughout his career.

Boss Roberto Mancini hardly picked him 12 months ago in a bid to get him fit again — and that was the start of the problems between the pair.

It looked as though he would leave City after their bust-up in Munich in September but now things are fine.

And De Jong said: “He’s on fire and when you have a Tevez who’s on fire it’s good for any team.

“If he continues like Sunday he’ll score a lot of goals and that can only be good for the rest of the season.”

De Jong was back in the City starting line-up on Sunday despite the two Milan clubs showing interest in signing him.

He seems likely to stay at the Etihad and go into the last year of his current contract as talks over a new deal have stalled.

And he has told pals to expect more afternoons like they had at Anfield — because everyone will want to beat the champions.

He said: “We must sort some small things out and keep improving because it’s not going to be easy.

“Wherever we go people are going to want to beat the champions. So we have to stand tall.”

City have now gone behind in their last four matches as their once water-tight defence has sprung holes.

De Jong said: “Yes it’s a bad habit, I don’t know what it is. We picked it up in the final game of last season against QPR and we’ve continued it with our first two games.

“We must improve and show we are up for the test wherever we go. There are enough qualities in the squad.”

Mancini said: “I don’t like conceding all these goals. If we continue to concede two goals every game, it’s going to be difficult for us to win. We need to pay more attention.

“We played well in the first 30 minutes, we had a lot of chances.

“When you have chances you need to score them.

“I feel at the moment we are not 100 per cent for many reasons. But because of this it was important that we did not lose the game.”