Pep Guardiola and Ilkay Gundogan were not on the same page after Manchester City’s latest defeat against Juventus in the Champions League on Wednesday night.
City’s nightmare run continued as they were beaten 2-0 in Turin thanks to goals from Dusan Vlahovic and Weston McKennie, which left them 22nd in the Champions League table with just two victories from six games.
Guardiola’s side have won just one match in their last 10 across all competitions as they struggle in a way which has not been seen for years.
Speaking after the loss in Italy, Gundogan suggested City are overcomplicating things, leading to basic errors.
‘It’s very disappointing,’ said the German midfielder on TNT Sports. ‘We had chances to score a few goals but at the moment it feels like every attack we concede is just so dangerous.
‘I don’t know, I have a feeling sometimes we are a bit careless with duels, instead of playing simple we over complicate things and we missed the right timing to release the ball. Just lose the ball and give them counter attacks.
‘We are built for possession, keep the ball, be strong, if you can’t do anything don’t lose it. At the moment it’s not working out for us.
‘Obviously that’s a mental issue as well. You can see that. We sometimes, one action we miss the ball, lose a duel and you see that we drop immediately, lose the rhythm, they are able to break our rhythm with the easiest of things. They don’t even need to do much.
‘I feel like we know exactly what’s going wrong. If you look at the most part of games even today we actually didn’t play bad, created chances, just missed to score, in these kind of games if you give away once chance it’s not easy to bounce back.’
Gundogan’s comments on overcomplicating their play were put to the Manchester City manager and he looked more confused than anything.
‘He said we don’t need…sorry? No, no, we have done it today, other days, no, but today we have done it, we have done it really well,’ said Guardiola.
‘We didn’t lose many balls as happened in the past, we tried to arrive in the [best] positions. Italian teams defend so deep they are so compact, they are the master of these situations. Even with that we played like who we are. We missed the result but the performance is there.’
The struggling Spaniard has largely stuck to the line that his team are indeed playing well during their extremely sticky patch, it is just the final product that is lacking.
‘We played good, really, really good,’ he said. ‘We missed the last part, the last action and we arrive, so.
‘We concede a few, some transition happened. I’m so proud of these players, they give everything and they tried and we live in this period and hopefully we can change the results.
‘I know it’s difficult the result. It’s difficult in the Champions League, in Europe, but we play very good.’
The Premier League champions are back in action on Sunday as they play host in a fascinating Manchester derby,
MORE: Martin Keown tells Mikel Arteta to replace Arsenal star after Monaco win
MORE: Rio Ferdinand makes prediction for Manchester derby after Man City lose again
MORE: Arsenal mocked over ‘embarrassing and cringey’ new mural outside Emirates Stadium
Share your story or advertise with us: Whatsapp: +2347068606071 Email: info@newspotng.com
