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The UEFA Champions League Round of 16 draw held on Friday with Manchester City, winner of the immediate past edition, conspicuously missing....TAP HERE TO READ THE FULL STORY..>>
The absence of Pep Guardiola side from the ongoing UEFA Champions League aptly describes the poor state of a team that dominated the Premier League like a colossus in the past seven seasons.
It is not only in the UEFA Champions League that Manchester City are not in contention, they are out of the Premier League title race, the league they won six out of the last seven editions, setting a record of four straight titles.
This was a team that denied Arsenal the opportunity of winning the Premier League in the last two seasons, piping the Gunners to the title in a ruthless manner thaty makes Arsenal look childish.
The fear of Guardiola’s Manchester City seems to the beginning of wisdom in the Premier League, building the team into a dominant force and no wonder at the onset of the 2024/25 season, Manchester City were the favourites to retain the Premier League title, with Arsenal coming a distant second and Liverpool that are dictating the pace tipped as the third team to win it.
But this is not the situation now with Manchester City, after 25 round of games, Manchester City are in the battle of their life to be in the Top Four, if possible place fifth, so as to qualify for the next season’s UEFA Champions League.
Guardiola, who is used to dictating the pace even while at Barcelona and Bayern Munich, is now experiencing the pain he’s used to inflict on other coaches.
Guardiola during the week admitted the reality of the situation after City were comprehensively knocked out of the Champions League by Real Madrid on 6-3 goals aggregate, saying, “nothing is eternal”.
Life has a way of humbling somebody. This applies to Guardiola. Truth is, nothing lasts forever. Guardiola has been on amazing success in England, but it will not last forever. What has a beginning certainly has an end.
City have enjoyed great success under him, with their trophy haul including six Premier Leagues and the European Cup in 2023. However, they have endured the most testing campaign of his reign this season, having dropped out of the domestic title race amid an injury crisis and now out of Europe after Wednesday’s loss in Madrid.
“Nothing is eternal,” Guardiola said.
“We have been unbelievable and we have to try step by step to get better from today.
“We have been extraordinarily extraordinary in the past, but not any more.
“We have 13 games (left in the Premier League) and have to be top four or five to try to be (in the UEFA Champions League) again.
Qualifying for next season’s Champions League is a Herculean task for Guardiola. Should they qualify as expected, the scale of rebuild was laid bare by the way and manner Real Madrid dumped them out of the Champions League on Wednesday night. City lost both legs of the qualifier. They lost the first Leg at Etihad 3-2 and lost the reverse fixture at the Santiago Bernabeu 3-1.
“We couldn’t defend well with the movement from Kylian Mbappe and it was more difficult,” said Guardiola after the game on Wednesday.
“The best team won, they deserved it. They were better. What we have to do is accept the reality and move forward.”
Ben Ransom in an article in skysports.com on Friday stated that despite City spending nearly £200m in January, the scale of rebuild was still huge.
“I think that the facts are laid pretty bare that Man City were so far below the level they had to be to compete against Real Madrid in Spain. The team was not the team we’re used to seeing. They were unrecognisable in the sense that with the ball they didn’t cause enough problems. After the match Guardiola was a little bit more honest when he was talking about the need to perhaps rebuild.
“The summer will be more about players leaving. Look at the contracts which are up in June – the likes of Kevin De Bruyne or Ilkay Gundogan. The following summer is perhaps even more pressing given there is another raft of players – the likes of John Stones, who unfortunately got yet another injury in Madrid, plus Bernardo Silva and Ederson – also out of contract. These are all players that either are, or will be, in their 30s by the time the end of their contracts comes around.”
The club has to look seriously at where those players are in terms of their careers and how they need to get back to matching Real Madrid, who it has to be said were a better team than I’ve seen in the last couple of seasons.
“So where now? This was something that Pep spoke about after the game, too. It’s very difficult. You could tell he was very downbeat. He spoke after the game about how City motivate themselves for the rest of the season, because they have to pick themselves up this weekend to go into what is a huge match in the Premier League against Liverpool, a team who have been their biggest rival.
“And we are now weeks, and weeks, and weeks on from losing Rodri. There have been so many games played and there isn’t that solution which has presented itself.
“We have had flashes, like at the weekend in the Premier League against Newcastle with Nico Gonzalez, the ‘mini-Rodri’ all of a sudden, but in Madrid those same players were a shadow of the team we saw at the weekend.
“So it is a tough one for Pep. He is obviously trying to stay positive. They’ve got to finish in the Champions League places.
AP Sports Writer, Steve Douglas, was more emphatic, stating, “A big rebuild is coming at Manchester City — and top of the list in the clear-out appears to be the injury-prone stalwarts who cannot hack modern-day soccer’s demanding schedule.
“Pep Guardiola was very open Friday about the new “reality” facing City after his most challenging season at a club that has set new standards in the Premier League but is now staring at the end of a dynasty.”
Stating further, Douglas noted, “A record-extending fifth straight Premier League title is realistically out of reach. The dream of winning another Champions League is over after a two-legged humbling by Real Madrid before even the last 16. Big changes, it seems, are now necessary.
“It’s so demanding,” the City manager said. “Teams are quicker, faster and stronger, and we cannot handle it right now.”
Most despairing for Guardiola are the injury issues that have rocked his squad all season. Rodri, City’s midfield anchor and most important player, damaged his ACL in September and is out for the season. City’s four centre backs — Ruben Dias, John Stones, Manuel Akanji and Nathan Ake — have each had long periods out. Kevin De Bruyne looks to be past his best after big injuries and didn’t even come off the bench in the one-sided 3-1 loss at Madrid on Wednesday that shone a huge light on City’s regression this season.
“Guardiola didn’t name names when he spoke about certain players not being robust enough to handle an increasingly packed schedule of games every three or four days. But players like Stones, De Bruyne, Ake and even Jack Grealish look to be at risk, along with those in their 30s — like Ilkay Gundogan, Bernardo Silva and Mateo Kovacic — who have struggled with the physicality of matches this season.
“We have to sit down with the doctors, physios, the players, their agents and be clear that some of them cannot sustain every three days,” Guardiola said. “Every month or two months playing every three or four days — this is the reality.
“It’s one more year and then a World Cup. And we have already a lot of players who cannot sustain what we have done in the past, every week, playing in different competitions, traveling, without any problems. The quality is there. But there’s a lot of quality we cannot use because of the injuries.”
