“You’re getting sacked in the morning,” sang the Brighton & Hove Albion fans in Pep Guardiola’s direction as Manchester City slumped to their fourth consecutive defeat.
It is a very unusual quirk that Guardiola is more likely to sign a new contract than be given the elbow over the next few weeks, and the vast majority of City fans would be delighted with that.
But the man who has turned City into a football superpower is facing one of the biggest challenges of his nine-year tenure.
“I will not step back at all, less than ever,” he insisted to reporters after the defeat at the Amex Stadium, another hint that he might soon put pen to paper on a one-year deal. That is the feeling inside the club — or, at the very least, it was a few days ago.
“More than ever I want to do it,” he said on Saturday.
It was the same sentiment following the defeat at Sporting Lisbon on Tuesday when he was asked about the possibility of taking the Brazil job. “More than ever, I want to lift the team and return them to their top level.”
It makes for quite an interesting international break. Guardiola has some rare time to decide if he will stay or go when his contract expires at the end of the season, but also to reflect on why his team has lost four matches in 11 days. He has been happy with how they have played in three of those games — the exception being the 2-1 loss at Bournemouth last weekend — but knows performances are not enough.
The root cause is fairly obvious. Injuries are often disregarded when top teams with big budgets are struggling, but a glance at City’s line-up and substitutes’ bench at Brighton demonstrates how Guardiola’s selection options are limited.
City have previously not looked like themselves at this time of the year before roaring back anyway but Guardiola said this run is different.
“In terms of results it can be similar, the point is we don’t have the players,” he said. “All four central defenders are injured. And Rodri, the best player, is not there. Kevin De Bruyne is away from his best. Jeremy Doku is injured. Jack Grealish is injured. You can do it for one game but to be consistent, you cannot.”
He revealed that Nathan Ake and Manuel Akanji could not play at all despite being on the bench — Ake has a hamstring issue and Akanji “said he could not move in training” on Friday, according to the manager.
“It looks like I am complaining but it’s not that. We played really good but if you ask me, ‘How does it compare to previous seasons?’, in previous seasons, we had the squad.”
Doku got injured after the 2-1 win against Wolverhampton Wanderers three weeks ago, came back for two cameo appearances in the last week and is now out again. Dias is out with a calf injury because of too much football. Ake had a hamstring injury earlier in the season, came back and is now out again. Akanji has been filling in while this has been going on and has succumbed, too. Guardiola highlighted that Kyle Walker “is not ready for 90 minutes at all”, as has been evident in the past two league games.
That raises some concerns that even those who return soon could take a while to get back up to speed. Ilkay Gundogan has escaped injury but has not been the player he was before leaving City. Phil Foden has been improving and will need to get back to his levels from the end of last season to make a bigger difference.
Bernardo Silva summed up the problem in midweek. “Even when we are playing well we don’t score our chances and we concede too easily,” he said. That was the case again on Saturday — City could have been a couple of goals up at half-time but failed to keep up with Brighton after the break.
“We have one more game before the international break, which will definitely be good for us,” Bernardo had said before the Brighton game. Afterwards, Guardiola said it would be good for everybody to go away and not see each other, and hopes that the injury situation clears up soon.
“When the players come back and we can (add) some individual qualities (to) the team, we’ll be back,” Guardiola said.
But ‘being there’ is the minimum that Guardiola requires — his players being locked in and giving their all. They are committed on the pitch but that is seemingly not enough to ‘be there’, due to the injuries.
“I’d like all the squad to fight and if someone (wins) it, OK, congratulations, not give it away because we are not there,” he says. “I have that feeling we are not there, we cannot do it every three days with the situation we have.”
This was in response to a question about whether his City era is coming to an end, which gives an idea of the atmosphere inside the Amex after full-time.
“I would love to have the players,” he continued, before raising the dark spectre of City dropping off like the other Premier League winners since 2012 have done.
“I said before, Liverpool with Jurgen (Klopp) after winning the Champions League and Premier League they had Virgil van Dijk injured for six months, one year, a lot of injuries and they went to the Europa League (dropping out of the Premier League’s top four in the 2022-23 season). We need (players) to do it but now we don’t have it.”
So, is that where things are heading? Or is it as simple as the players coming back and performances improving?
There have been some rumblings of discontent; Guardiola has hinted that he wanted some of his absent players to make more of an effort to be available, while the ongoing situation with Grealish and his England call-up is a source of frustration.
Despite the bright spells, the results will be frustrating to the players to the point that the international break represents a welcome escape.
Either way, it is not like City have a gentle reintroduction in a fortnight. They have Tottenham Hotspur at home and then Liverpool away, with an admittedly lenient but still important Champions League game against Feyenoord in between.
It is not hyperbole to say that if the current situation continues in those games — City play well even for large parts but fail to maintain the energy — they will struggle to take any points from the league games. It is also not an exaggeration to say that once those players — barring Rodri, who will miss the whole season — return, the concern of these dark days will probably look quite silly.
Uncertainty remains over how quickly those players will regain fitness. A run of fixtures against Nottingham Forest, Crystal Palace, Juventus, Manchester United and Aston Villa up to Christmas will not leave much margin for error.
(Top photo: Crystal Pix/MB Media/Getty Images)
