Josep Guardiola has spoken candidly about the challenge of playing against Jurgen Klopp’s Liverpool side after Manchester City were kicked out of the Champions League by Real Madrid.
Josep Guardiola talks about his biggest challenge as a manager
Josep Guardiola has hit back at suggestions that Real Madrid pose the biggest challenge of his career after Manchester City were once again kicked out of the Champions League by the Spanish giants, and singled out manager Jurgen Klopp.
City lost 2-1 on the night, 5-1 on aggregate, and were eliminated from the competition in the last 16. Bernardo Silva was sent off in the 20th minute for giving away a penalty, which was converted by Vinicius Junior, and Erling Haaland’s equalizer was canceled out by Vinicius’ second goal in the second half.
This means Real have eliminated City from the Champions League for the third season in a row. In fact, since Guardiola’s side lost to Chelsea in the 2021 final, no other team has been blamed for the departure.
Despite this, Guardiola was in no mood to praise Real’s talent in the game after the game. Asked by a reporter if Real were the biggest challenge of his career, he replied with a smile in comments translated from Spanish: “No, playing against Jurgen Klopp at Liverpool was the biggest challenge. You can hardly understand what it was like to play against Liverpool.”
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“Those games were a great learning experience for the team, because playing against a team like us that wasn’t in the competition 12 or 13 years ago, and the generation we were in, sometimes they won the game, and sometimes Real Madrid beat us and we won. We had a great time too.”
He had some great words for his opponent, saying: “Madrid are an extraordinary team and they punish you when you make mistakes.
“The future is bright and we will be back next season. We will learn. Sport is a challenge. We will congratulate Madrid and take the feeling that we were not able to play a proper game 11-on-11 to go home and see what happened.”
Real Madrid beat Manchester City again (Image: Jose Breton/Getty Images)
Guardiola’s words come from statistics. He faced Real Madrid 30 times as manager of Barcelona, Bayern Munich and City, winning 14, losing 10 and drawing 6. On the other hand, the results between Klopp’s Liverpool and Borussia Dortmund are 30 matches played, 11 wins, 12 losses, and 7 draws.
City have won every game under Guardiola over the past 10 years, but have only won the Champions League once, in 2023. In 2021, they lost to Chelsea in the final, and until recently they had often struggled against Carlo Ancelotti’s Real. Ancelotti is the only manager to have won five titles, surpassing Guardiola’s three.
Josep Guardiola lost again to Real Madrid (Image: MB Media/Getty Images)
Guardiola will now turn his attention to Sunday’s Carabao Cup final against Arsenal. City also have an FA Cup quarter-final against Liverpool on April 4th, as they look to overcome a nine-point gap with Arsenal in the Premier League.
“We are not a perfect team, that is the reality,” Guardiola admitted. “I’ve been with the Manchester City team since we were a team in many aspects that define us and we still are.
“But in that regard, we still have the final on Sunday, the FA Cup (draw) with Liverpool and we still have to compete and do well in the Premier League. We will prepare good decisions for next season and be back in the Champions League next season.”
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