London: It’s been a decade since Pep Guardiola won the Champions League. If that already feels an absurdly long time for someone widely feted as the greatest active soccer manager, one needs to consider another aspect. Pep Guardiola hasn’t even reached the final across those 10 years.
So, can his latest iteration at Manchester City – a relentless, record-shattering team closing in on another English Premier League title – end the wait? Guardiola, at least in public, is trying not to get caught up in the hype.
“It’s nothing special, nothing different,” Guardiola said Tuesday of the Champions League. His comments came a day before City play Borussia Moenchengladbach in the first leg of the round of 16.
Guardiola was pushed repeatedly about the significance of the Champions League. He was asked whether it was bigger than the English league. Guardiola used the same old mantra, in a clear attempt to take the pressure off both him and City.
“We’re going to play the game tomorrow like we played the last games. I would say the whole season in all competitions,” Guardiola said. “Nothing special. It’s a football game. Ninety minutes. We’re going to do a good game, to try to continue and get a good result, and afterward think about West Ham (in the Premier League). That’s the target. The same process mentally,” he added.
It’s understandable why Guardiola is trying to keep a lid on expectations. City has gone through pain attempting to become European champions for the first time after years of heavy spending. Since the Spaniard arrived in 2016, City has been eliminated by Monaco in the last 16, Liverpool then Tottenham in the quarterfinals and then — perhaps most disappointingly — Lyon in a one-legged quarterfinal last season.
Guardiola has been accused of overthinking his tactics for knockout games, like when he changed formation to match Lyon’s in August — serving only to undermine the strengths of his own team because he was preoccupied by a more limited opponent, at least on paper., Guardiola hinted Tuesday that such overthinking might be a thing of the past.
“We are going to prepare the game like a normal game,” he said. “We are going to treat Moenchengladbach as a team like we have done against Arsenal, Liverpool, Everton, Tottenham (in recent Premier League matches),” asserted the Spaniard.
“We’re not going to change absolutely anything — little details to adapt a little what they are, but it’s not different to what we do most of the time in the Premier League,” he added.
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