In defence of Guardiola

Guillem Balague explains why Pep Guardiola deserves patience as he tries to get it right at Manchester City.

Guardiola won the league title in his first season at both Barcelona and Bayern Munich. In fact, in his first year in charge of both those clubs he swept all of his domestic rivals aside.

After 10 wins in a row at the start of this season, it seemed he would do the same at Manchester City. But City hit a roadblock – and Guardiola’s critics were quick to make themselves heard.

Wednesday’s win over Watford was just their fifth in 16 games in all competitions and during that spell Guardiola has been criticised for over-complicating his tactics, encouraging his players to take risks in dangerous areas and for his team selection. People have said he is not suited to the Premier League and doesn’t understand the English game.  

But are those criticisms fair? I don’t think they are. 

Guardiola has been accused of not caring about defending. His revelation that he doesn’t spend time working on tackling on the training pitch fuelled that theory. But let’s look at the facts. Only six teams have a better defensive record than City this season so it’s hardly a disaster. But looking back at Guardiola’s record, we can see he has been hugely successful at keeping the opposition out.

In each of his previous seven seasons as a manager his team have finished with the best defence in their respective league. And by a long way. I fully expect Guardiola’s City to be among the tightest defences come the end of the season.

Indeed, there is an assumption that Guardiola should instantly transform City into the …

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