Manager Josep Guardiola admitted that “rules are rules” after Manchester City were forced to change the timing of Friday’s press conference to avoid further fines from the Premier League. In recent years they have been hit with a £3 million bill for delaying kick-offs over the past two seasons.
He was fined £2.09 million and fined £1 million for 31 match delays. The league says proper timekeeping “helps ensure that the organization of competitions is set to the highest possible professional standards.” And Guardiola had to abide by similar rules the day before the match.
Guardiola has held his last two press conferences at 2pm on Fridays, 30 minutes after the league’s deadline for all 20 clubs to begin their press conferences by 1:30pm on Fridays, regardless of when their weekend games are scheduled.
They have received permission from the league to postpone their pre-match press conferences against Bournemouth and Liverpool. However, Guardiola had scheduled a midday training session on Friday and had hoped to start training again at 2pm, but was advised not to do so.
City and Guardiola were concerned about penalties for a third consecutive late start, so the 54-year-old instead opted for a 9am start and entered the City Football Academy’s Grand Media Auditorium at 8.57am in good spirits.
The Catalan appeared relaxed in front of the press, humorously criticizing the Premier League’s early start and saying he did not want to risk further fines.
Guardiola said, “We will train after this, but if we were to train from 12:00 to 1:30, we wouldn’t be able to be here in time (for the press conference).” “The Premier League doesn’t allow players to play after 2pm. The club said if I didn’t start the game by 2pm they would either fine me or they would fine the club.”
City are well aware of how severe penalties can be in the Premier League, having been fined more than £3m in total for being late at the start of games and after half-time in the past two seasons.
During the 2023/24 season, the Blues were fined more than £2 million for delaying kick-offs in 22 of 38 games. Last season, he was fined just over £1 million for nine repeat offenses.
Many of these offenses relate to City taking too long to return to the pitch after half-time, but Guardiola lightheartedly pointed out that pop stars Burna Boy and Anitta were not fined for delaying City’s 2023 Champions League final with their pre-match performances.
“I paid a lot of money because I was late at halftime,” he said jokingly. “You might arrive a minute late, but rules are rules and the Premier League is perfect in that respect, right?”
“When we played in the Champions League final, they put on a show before the game, but they’re always late. They have to fine the singers!”
“That’s why I decided it was 9 a.m. and the journalists were having breakfast so I needed to have coffee.”
