Pep Guardiola has been uncharacteristically blunt this week in his assessment of what Manchester City must do to overhaul Arsenal in the Premier League title race, and Sunday’s trip to Stamford Bridge against Chelsea carries precisely the kind of high-stakes, uncomfortable pressure the Catalan manager has thrived on during his near-decade at the club.
City arrive having had a full week to prepare following their Champions League elimination by Real Madrid in the last 16, a luxury Arsenal — who beat Sporting in Portugal on Tuesday — have not enjoyed.
“In the situation we are in the Premier League, we need to win all of them, otherwise it will not give us the chance to try until the end,” Guardiola told reporters on Friday.
“We have not been consistent enough this season. We have dropped points that we should have taken, which is why we are now in the position where we cannot do anything differently.” It was a rare public acknowledgment of fallibility from a manager accustomed to projecting calm certainty, and it reflects a genuine sense within the City camp that the margin for error has been reduced to nothing.
Chelsea will be without Enzo Fernandez, who remains suspended after manager Liam Rosenior sanctioned the Argentine vice-captain for comments made during the international break that publicly cast doubt over his future at Stamford Bridge. Fernandez told ESPN Argentina after Chelsea’s Champions League exit to PSG that he did not know whether he would remain at the club beyond the summer, remarks that Rosenior described as crossing a line in terms of the culture he is trying to build. “He’s apologised to me, he’s apologised to the club,” Rosenior said on Friday.
“He won’t play on Sunday but hopefully after that he’ll be a massive part of the group moving forward.” Chelsea enter the game sixth in the table, having taken just five points from their last available 18 — a dismal sequence that has complicated what had looked like a comfortable push for European qualification.
City’s statistical record in the final weeks of a season is the source of most of their remaining optimism. Over the three previous seasons, Guardiola’s side have accumulated 78 points from a possible 87 from April 1 onwards, a figure that underscores the clinical relentlessness that has become their calling card. If they are to replicate that once more, Sunday’s game against a disjointed Chelsea side is exactly the kind of fixture they need to win.
