Eliaquim Mangala has admitted he has been too inconsistent since his record £42m transfer to Manchester City, with the central defender confessing English football has taken him by surprise.

The 23-year-old Frenchman made an impressive debut for City in the 1-1 draw against Chelsea during September. But in his next league outing at Hull City the Frenchman had a nightmare afternoon, scoring an own goal and giving away a penalty from which the Tigers also scored.

This started a pattern of uneven form, with Mangala managing 13 league starts and yet to become an automatic choice despite the club paying a fee that is the highest for a defender in British football.

He said: “My debut against Chelsea went very well. After that I had games that didn’t go as well as I would have liked and some that went great. I need to be more consistent – not to have one good game, then a bad game, two good games, and one medium performance and so on.

“Of course there is a period of adjustment that every player makes when they arrive in England. I was expecting a quick pace, intensity and physical games. But there is a difference between what you think you will find out and what you actually experience and it would be true to say the physicality and intensity is more than I’d imagined when I first arrived.”