Considering his team had just racked up their 10th victory in all competitions, scoring 26 goals in the process and conceding just six, Pep Guardiola’s message for his rivals was pretty ominous.
“We are far away. If we were close then I could just go back home,” he said with a smirk.
Manchester City’s manager had just been asked to assess how much progress his new charges have made since he assumed control in July. Judging by the build-up play on Saturday against Swansea City in the 3-1 victory – which Guardiola rated as their best since his arrival, even if the final ball sometimes went astray – they are not that far away.
Different things
“We are here to get better,” he said. “You always have to keep going. It never ends in football. You can always improve: individual performances, collective performances. You can always create different things and that’s why the game is nice.”
That is Guardiola: ever the perfectionist. Even Sergio Agüero, fresh from scoring his 10th and 11th goals in just six matches, was not immune from his criticism as Guardiola said he “wants more” from his star striker. But while City also went into their sixth Premier League match last season with a 100 per cent record under Manuel Pellegrini only to be beaten by West Ham , there was little chance of the same fate befalling his successor in Wales, even if Swansea caused his side some real problems.
Potential flaw
Their equaliser came courtesy of a blistering finish from Fernando Llorente, but also highlighted a potential flaw in his new team. With full-backs
Bacary Sagna
and
Aleksandar Kolarov
both given licence to push forward, gaps inevitably open up behind them and the presence of the more offensive-minded Ilkay Gundogan in central midfield alongside Fernandinho does leave City open to being caught out.
Sagna’s defensive fallibility allowed Gylfi Sigurdsson to take advantage of the Frenchman’s slip and play in Llorente for his goal, even if afterwards Guardiola was at pains to stress that he is more than happy with his options at right-back.
“I trust a lot with Bacary Sagna, I trust a lot with Pablo Zabaleta,” he said. “I want to, especially in that position, make a rotation in the players.”
In the short term, they will probably be all right. But Guardiola will know sterner tests await, not least against Tottenham – who he described as “one of the best teams in the last two years” – next week in White Hart Lane.
Home and away defeats against Mauricio Pochettino’s side last season severely undermined Pellegrini’s title challenge and it will be most fascinating to see how Guardiola approaches that tactical battle.
The temporary loss of De Bruyne, who won the decisive penalty before limping off with a hamstring strain that looks like keeping him out of next month’s World Cup qualifiers, will also be an important hurdle to clear – although this City side is already crammed full of match winners.
"It is early to say what we are going to be doing but we want to be champions, we are gunning for titles and we need to keep our heads down and keep going step by step," Raheem Sterling said.
“We have to just keep humble, keep working hard. We have to remind ourselves it is only September, the season has a lot left in it. We have to take it game by game, I know that sounds boring but that’s the way it is.”
His manager will certainly have no complaints.
Guardian Service
