The Catalan coach will be experiencing a strange feeling after being dethroned by Liverpool, but he is already plotting how to regain the crown
When Manchester City take on Wolves on Friday, something will be missing. For the first time in almost four years, Pep Guardiola's side will take to the pitch like any other ordinary Premier League team. The gold Premier League badge they have worn on their right sleeves since May 2021 to show they are champions will be gone. It will be replaced by an ordinary blue badge, the one worn by every other team, bar one.
Guardiola effectively conceded that City were not going to be winning the league as far back as in November, but it does not mean it felt any less painful when Liverpool were confirmed as the new champions on Sunday, at exactly the same time that City had just beaten Nottingham Forest to reach the FA Cup final. Many managers would have looked on the positive side after winning a semi-final tie at Wembley, but Guardiola cut a serious figure when asked if this season was going to turn out alright after all.
"Nooooo… We are a thousand million points behind Liverpool. It's not good," Guardiola said. In the interests of accuracy, the gap between Liverpool and City is 21 points, but to a coach with an unquenchable thirst for winning, it might as well have been a thousand million. Guardiola has only failed to win the league title on four occasions in his 16 seasons as an elite manager and he will already by plotting the reconquest.
When City failed to win the title in Guardiola's first season in charge in 2016-17, he responded by spending £214 million ($286m) on new signings, and a year later they reclaimed their crown by amassing a record 100 points, before retaining it the following year by earning another 98. And when City lost out to Liverpool in the 2019-20 campaign, finishing 18 points off the pace, they responded by winning a record four titles in a row.
Make no mistake about it, City will be back next season desperate to swipe the title straight out of Liverpool's hands. And here's what they need to do to ensure the trophy only has a one-year hiatus from the Etihad Stadium…
Getty Images SportFind a new No.1
Only a year ago, City's goalkeeper situation seemed to be in perfectly good health, with Stefan Ortega proving a reliable and often brilliant back-up to Ederson. The German was even credited with keeping the 2024 title bid on track with his awesome save from Son Heung-min in the penultimate game of the season against Tottenham.
But this campaign has underlined the need for City to find not one new goalkeeper, but two.Guardiola's lack of satisfaction with both his shot-stoppers was plain to see in January's 2-2 draw at Brentford as, after he had dropped Ederson for the trip to west London – and not for the first time this season, either – he was then seen at full-time screaming in Ortega's ear, clearly furious at the way the 'keeper had conceded two late goals.
It has been an open secret since then that City are looking for a new No.1. Ederson wanted to leave for Saudi Arabia last summer before Guardiola persuaded him to stay, but the coach did not even try to deny that the goalkeeper's future at the club was in doubt when asked about the Brazilian before the FA Cup semi-final, merely responding "I don't want to respond about this situation right now."
Ederson might have a remarkable four assists this season – unheard of for a goalkeeper – but his ability to keep the ball out of the net has been waning for some time and he has proved a liability on numerous occasions, particularly in the Champions League. Both Ederson and Ortega's contracts expire in 2026, so City better get ahead of the game and bring in a new No.1 who can guard their goal for at least the next five years. Porto captain Diogo Costa is the leading candidate, while Lyon's Lucas Chevalier also has admirers at the Etihad.
AdvertisementGetty Images SportManage Rodri's return
Liverpool may well have won the league regardless, but there can be no question that the most pivotal moment in City's season came when Rodri tore his cruciate ligament against Arsenal in September. The team had only lost one game with Rodri in the line-up since November 2022, but just two months after the agonising injury they were at the end of a five-game losing run which left their campaign in tatters. By March, City had nine Premier League defeats, the joint-highest number Guardiola had ever lost as a coach in a league season.
Rodri has now returned to training and there is chance he makes his comeback before the season finishes. Guardiola, however, needs to tread cautiously when it comes to reintegrating the 2024 Ballon d'Or winner. Rodri suffered his injury just days after warning of the threat to player welfare of playing too many matches, and City must do everything to ensure he does not get injured again. That means rotating the player every so often and listening to him he says he needs to rest. It should also mean using him sparingly in this summer's Club World Cup, if at all.
The Spain international should feel refreshed mentally and physically next season after so long out, and if Rodri can stay injury-free and get some help from the next generation of players, he can guide City back towards their crown.
Getty ImagesSign a De Bruyne replacement
Although it is expected to be a busy transfer window for City across the board, the biggest decision they will make this summer is how they replace Kevin De Bruyne. The Belgian was an unused substitute in the FA Cup semi-final win over Forest, the latest demonstration that he is no longer seen as essential in the biggest games, and both his injury problems and struggles to call upon his supernatural abilities of old to win matches have been big factors in City's struggles.
While he recovered from a five-month absence from a torn hamstring to drag Guardiola's side over the line in the title race last season, all De Bruyne's previous fitness problems seem to have caught up with him. And though he will rightly be remembered as arguably City's greatest-ever player, few fans will disagree that the time has come for him to move on.
City have known all year that this day was going to come and they have had plenty of time to identify the ideal successor to De Bruyne. Florian Wirtz is the outstanding candidate, while Morgan Gibbs-White is close behind. There is even an argument that City should try and sign both players, especially after being decimated by injuries this season and with the Club World Cup likely to put more strain on their squad.
De Bruyne's departure will free up enough room on the wage bill to pay the salaries of both Wirtz and Gibbs-White, and although both players would garner hefty transfer fees, they could be amortised over a long-term period to comply with the Premier League's Profit and Sustainability Rules.
Signing just one of these brilliant No.10s would be a huge boost in City's bid to wrest their crown back from Liverpool, but getting both of them could make them almost unstoppable.
(C)Getty ImagesRestore the hunger
Last season, City did what no team in 135 years of English football had ever done before by winning a fourth-consecutive league title. Granted, they were favourites to go on and win a fifth this term, but it should not be surprising that they were unable to maintain the same hunger after such a historic achievement. The fact that the squad was practically the same, with Savinho the only fresh arrival last summer along with the returning Ilkay Gundogan, did not help.
But while some drop-off should have been expected after City had won so much, Guardiola did not understand the complacency that gripped his players, and nor was he willing to accept it. "We need to recover the spirit,” he said last week. "When we scored a goal, we didn’t celebrate. When we scored the first goal in October, November, December, January, we didn’t celebrate in the way of the body language [of how] we celebrate. That is a stupid detail but it says a lot about the passion we had all the time in this season – we didn’t have it."
Needless to say, Guardiola will not stand for his players not showing the necessary hunger next season, although it should be easier to rally his team to win their title back than for them to retain it for a fourth time. The Catalan could use the carrot approach and find new ways to motivate his team, or he could use the stick and root out any players who he senses no longer have the same fire in their bellies. Whichever method he chooses, it needs to result in his team working much harder than they have done this term.