The last time Manchester City lost four successive games, Pep Guardiola was winding down his playing career in Mexico. The Abu Dhabi takeover was simply a negotiation. The new English rage was Chelsea, their cold-eyed owner, the handsome and brazen manager and his galaxy of young stars. No one noticed City’s losing streak, which stretched to six, under the former England defender Stuart Pearce in 2006. He survived the axe and another year at the then City of Manchester Stadium, a compact and hostile arena.
But by 2024, City has remoulded into one of the formidable dynasties in England that even a lone defeat is forensically and mercilessly dissected. Four defeats on the spin has spurred a riot of feeling, from shock to sadism, and a casket of narrative threads. Whether it’s the beginning of the end, or the end; whether it’s a sign of Guardiola and his team feeling bored, whether all the success has killed their drive, or whether it’s just another slip-up triggered by injury, form and fitness. The comment of Bernardo Silva that the “club is in a dark space” has instigated the conspiracy theorists.
Perhaps it’s all of these and none of these. Injuries to the two cornerstones of the Pep Empire—Kevin de Bruyne and Rodri—have immensely dented them. The pair has been the creative and defensive axis. Not just them, other important players such as Ruben Dias, Jack Grealish, Jeremy Doku, Ilkay Gundogan, Nathan Ake, Akanji and Phil Foden too have been intermittently injured and not yet returned to their sharpest shape. Some others like Silva and Kyle Walker have looked tired, whereas some of the new recruits such as Matheus Nunes and Savio have not yet teethed into City’s system and syntax. Fatigue too would have kicked in, especially after the Euro and COPA year. It’s the sort of perfect storm—injuries, loss of form, fatigue, an ageing core and speculations on Guardiola’s future as he runs out of contract at the end of this year.
Manchester City’s head coach Pep Guardiola reacts during the UEFA Champions League opening phase soccer match between Sporting and Manchester City in Lisbon, Portugal. (AP)
But even a Manchester City-Guardiola crisis fascinates. As though this is just another twist before City twists the knife into their opponents’ back and running away with another league title, come the end of the season. That, this is the low that could soar them to loftier heights. Guardiola himself doesn’t appear too fussed. He is the same as always, angsty on the touchline, candid with the microphone.
The Spaniard has never lost four games at a stretch in his entire managerial career, spanning Spain, Germany and England and that has entered his 17th year. So personally, it’s a peculiar crisis for him.“It always happens one time in your lifetime, right? Always there is a first time,” he said after the Brighton loss in a rather pleasant tone.
It has coincided at a time when he was finessing a team different to any of his previous ones, when he was veering away from the ideologies that had formed and defined him. He has made it evident that he wants a more direct approach from his team. Death by speed displacing death by pass. His recent recruits smack of the paradigm shift. Doku, Savio and Nunes are not the conventional ball-keeping forwards, but those with speed to burn and tricks to showboat. The real sign of change perhaps is Erling Haaland, everything is tweaked to optimise the ludicrous goal-scoring knack of the Norwegian. In another era, Julian Alvarez would have been his front-man. Then, he has Haaland, so why not Haaland? He once moulded the best False Nine in the world out of Messi on the wings; perhaps now he wants to show he could create the best Real Nine too. Guardiola is an idealist, but an iconoclast too.
Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola. (Reuters)
So how he reverses City’s fortunes would be a compelling narrative, even if it would not define him. But the problem he has with the peculiar personnel at his disposal is that there are too many round holes for square pegs. If he goes for speed, he doesn’t have stability, neither in the midfield nor in the defence. The midfield could be over-run. Mateo Kovacic has a robust passing range but lacks the physicality of Rodri. If he does a double-pivot with Gundogan, the midfield becomes too stifled and slow. Both Sporting CP in the Champions League and Brighton in the Premier League adeptly exploited this, employing quick and robust central midfielders to nullify City.
In both games, he packed his midfield with passers and ball preserves. But none of them were physical enough to win the ball back after losing possession. Naturally, the defence too becomes porous, where again he has missed the one-on-one brilliance of Dias and the expertise of John Stones.
Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola speaks during a press conference. (File)
So, it is as much about him missing Rodri as the rest of the crew like De Bruyne, Silva and Foden, who had the technical ability to preserve possession and create opportunities for Haaland, not hitting their straps yet. So with Rodri ruled out for the season, Guardiola would want Silva and Foden to return to their best before the season goes beyond their reach.
A return to more archetypal Guardiola format—narrow midfield and compact frontline— could potentially work but so far he has not fully reverted to these versions. The international break could give him time to reflect. “I will reflect in these 10 days. Clear our heads, players will come back fit, this is the target,” he said. Or it could be a delicious balance. Or a new tactic, or reviving an old one. With Guardiola, even in bad times, there is always an intrigue, always a belief, rather than hope, that there could be something better still, that it could be just another fresh challenge for Guardiola, seemingly in a quest to find new ways to challenge him.
