Pep Guardiola lauds Man City for 'one of the BEST performances'
Pep Guardiola says Manchester City’s epic 4-1 fightback vs Liverpool was ‘one of the BEST performances’ his side have delivered in his seven years at the club, as he lumps praise on Jack Grealish and ‘exceptional signing’ Julian Alvarez
- Pep Guardiola has lauded his Man City team after their 4-1 win vs Liverpool
- The Spaniard claimed the win was ‘one of the best performances’ he’d overseen
- The manager also lauded Jack Grealish and ‘exceptional signing’ Julian Alvarez
Pep Guardiola has lauded his team for delivering one of their ‘best performances’ in his seven years at the football club, following Manchester City’s huge 4-1 victory against Liverpool.
The Spaniard joined the Citizens back in 2016 and has overseen some huge wins during his time at the club, a tenure that has also seen him win four Premier League titles, four League Cups and an FA Cup.
Some of those notable victories include an epic 6-0 drubbing against Chelsea in 2019, an 8-0 triumph over Watford the same year and more recently, an impressive 2-1 win against Real Madrid in 2020, at the Bernabeu no less and their 6-0 FA Cup win against Burnley.
But speaking today after his side’s epic four-goal fightback against Liverpool, the 52-year-old lauded his side for their resilience after Mohammed Salah gave Liverpool the lead after 17 minutes.
‘Minute one to minute 93 was a perfect performance – even though we conceded a goal we played really well,’ Guardiola said to BT Sport.
Pep Guardiola (right) has lauded his Manchester City team for ‘one of their best performances’
Jack Grealisih (left) was a standout performer during the match and scored the fourth goal
Guardiola also lauded Argentine striker Julian Alvarez calling him an ‘exceptional signging’
‘They [Liverpool] always have threat on transition but we played really good. One of the best performances in my seven years.’
‘The players knew we weren’t playing bad. One goal down and we continued to do it and had just a bit of chat at half time and were lucky to score the second goal. But then at 2-1 the game was stable.’
Trent Alexander-Arnold found Diogo Jota with a looping ball over the top of the City defence, with the Liverpool striker showing his strength to hold the ball up before laying off to Salah, who fired the ball into the back of the net with a vicious strike.
It was a dream start for the Reds at the Etihad Stadium, but things quickly went down hill from there, with Jack Grealish sliding a superb cross into the middle of the box for Julian Alvarez, who polished off an excellent move to pull City level.
The pair were instrumental throughout the match, with Guardiola lumping praise on the England forward in particular.
In attack and defence, the 27-year-old was excellent throughout the game, returning a goal and an assist for his labours, and was also pivotal in preventing Liverpool from scoring a second goal, sprinting the length of the pitch to cut out a pass from Salah to Jota that would have certainly seen the Portuguese striker make it 2-0.
‘I think this season is the [year] Jack we thought could help us. He saved us from conceding a second goal, the chance for Mo Salah and Jack helped us,’ the City boss said.
‘Riyad [Mahrez] was exceptional too, I cannot name one player better than another they were all exceptional.’
Mahrez would join in on the action just 53 seconds after half-time, taunting Liverpool down the right hand side of the pitch before teeing up Kevin De Bruyne for Man City’s second and his 100th career goal.
Interestingly it was the fastest goal that Liverpool have conceded in the second half of a Premier League match, and things would get much worse for Klopp’s side.
Ilkay Gundogan would extend the lead again seven minutes later, after Alvarez had his shot blocked by Alexander-Arnold, before the German turned in the rebound.
Grealish would go on to wrap up the scoring for his side, putting away a cross from De Bruyne polishing off what was a dominant display and brilliant come back, that keeps them within touching distance of Arsenal at the top of the Premier League.
After the match, Klopp’s press conference was much starker to Guardiola’s slamming his team for conceding the two goals in quick succession, claiming: ‘We conceded two quick goals and it is super-difficult if not impossible to come back, but we can make it more difficult if we stick to the things we did in our good moments.’
He also gave a scathing review of his team’s performances claiming that there were ‘only four performances were Ok’ claiming that Jordan Henderson, Fabinho, Cody Gakpo and Alisson were the only players who delivered.
It is the Reds ninth loss this season, a concerning statistic considering their performances losing just two games last season.
Guardiola, meanwhile was much more full of praise, highlighting one performance from his Argentine striker, Alvarez, who delivered today in the absence of injured Erling Haaland.
The 23-year-old World Cup winner joined the Manchester club last January for a fee of £21million from River Plate and has stepped up on several occasions this season returning six goals from 21 appearances in the Premier League, 13 across all competitions.
Kevin De Bruyne proved instrumental from midfield yet again and scored his 100th career goal
Grealish (right) was also a standout both in attack and defence returning one goal and an assist
Guardiola praised Alvarez (middle) for his performance and called him an ‘excellent signing’
The loss is Liverpool’s ninth this season, a poor statistic after losing just two games last season
And after yet another excellent performance from the Argentine, Guardiola praised the football club for their work acquiring him.
On Julian Alvarez: ‘Not just the goal, the assist in the second and third. He was so clever with the ball, he’s an exceptional player.
‘The club made an exceptional signing with him – he’s a world champion alongside Lionel Messi because he has something.’
Despite their epic win, City were unable to make up any ground on Arsenal in the Premier League standings with the Gunners going toe-to-toe also beating Leeds 4-1, to maintain their eight point cushion on the Citizens at the top of the table.
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