Pep Guardiola on Man City’s defensive display as he is pleased with ‘resilience’ of his ‘transition team’ at Emirates.
Pep Guardiola praises Manchester City’s ‘fantastic’ defensive display at Arsenal.
Despite giving up a late equaliser, Pep Guardiola commended Manchester City’s defensive tenacity and acknowledged that he had no option but to park the bus against Arsenal.
Erling Haaland’s early goal was cancelled out by a spectacular lob by Gabriel Martinelli, a replacement, in the third minute of stoppage time, making Mikel Arteta the first manager to defeat his countryman in five straight league games. In an unusually defensive performance, City only managed 32.8% of the ball at the Emirates, the lowest percentage for a Guardiola-coached club in a Premier League game.
“Our resilience was fantastic, otherwise we couldn’t survive,” Guardiola said. “Last season we lost 5-1; today we were close. It’s by far one of the best teams in Europe. I would prefer to play another way, but when we play a lot of games in 10 years [as City manager], the teams defend deep, deep, deep and take a result of fantastic performance, mindset, strategy … Sometimes it happens. You have to defend, honestly. It’s because the opponent is better. When you have to accept it, you have to survive in that way. And we did it.”
Asked about the possession statistics, he said: “One time in 10 years is not bad, right? I have to prove myself against another strategy. Now I am a transition team.”
After five games, Arsenal, who have placed second in the league the last three seasons, trail league leaders Liverpool by five points. Mikel Merino came off the bench at halftime and brought up the equaliser, but Arteta refused to take the criticism for his choice to start him over Eberechi Eze. However, he acknowledged that Viktor Gyökeres’ service needed to be improved after the new £55 million striker failed to register a shot throughout the game.
“To have very big open chances is extremely difficult, but he’s certainly trying his best and trying to do that, and we have to provide more for him,” Arteta said. “There were a lot of situations when the chances were there and then especially the final pass was missing today.”