Kevin De Bruyne has vented his frustration over the heavy tackles the Manchester City manager, Pep Guardiola, has complained have been meted out to his players.

The Spaniard was outspoken after the injury sustained by Leroy Sané at Cardiff in the FA Cup last weekend, while De Bruyne was reacting to challenges in the victory over West Bromwich Albion on Wednesday night – on him and his team-mate Brahim Díaz, another incident Guardiola was vexed about.

Guardiola said: “I could repeat what I said after the [Cardiff] game but it’s not necessary,” after reviewing the tackle on Díaz by Matt Phillips, but De Bruyne, who was caught by James McClean in the buildup to his goal, was more forthcoming.

Pep Guardiola pleads for players’ protection after Leroy Sané injury Read more

“I didn’t know the tackle was like that, I’ve just seen it. Let’s just say the ball was not in the neighbourhood,” he said. “The referee told me he didn’t touch me good enough to get the red card but obviously I told him: ‘I saw the guy, I was jumping.’”

In response to the question of whether teams were becoming frustrated with City’s dominance, De Bruyne answered: “I don’t know what they are thinking – you can also pull a shirt, that’s more effective than a tackle. Sometimes it gets frustrating. A lot of teams are making a lot of fouls against us. We make a foul, we get a yellow card, I don’t know how it’s possible sometimes.”

De Bruyne fears City could become stretched if more of his team-mates were sidelined, with David Silva having to be replaced at half-time owing to injury. “We don’t have a lot of players – particularly among the forwards, now there is [Silva], maybe, today. We just have one player for each position – and hopefully it can stay like this and people can come back as quickly as possible.”

His team-mate Bernardo Silva was adamant after Wednesday’s game that City are being targeted. “We hope that soon they start protecting our players because the way other teams are tackling our players it’s not part of the game, it’s not fair play,” he said.