Manchester City boss Pep Guardiola insists he will stick by his philosophy of allowing goalkeepers to play out from the back despite Claudio Bravo’s red card in Wednesday’s 4-0 Champions League loss to Barcelona.
The Nou Camp defeat means City have now failed to win any of their last four matches in all competitions, but they were very much in the contest until Bravo’s sending off with the score at 1-0.
The Chile international deliberately handled Luis Suarez’ goal-bound effort outside his penalty area, after unsuccessfully trying to pass the ball out from the back, leaving the referee with no option but to issue a straight red card.
The 33-year-old was trying to follow Guardiola’s instruction of passing out of defence and the Spaniard defended his philosophy after the match, stating that he will always try to get his teams to play in that style.
Guardiola said: “There will be no change. It stays the same. I’m sorry, until the last day of my career as a coach I will try to play from our goalkeeper.”
The former Barca boss is refusing to get too worried by his side’s recent dip in form, and is confident they can still secure progress to the knockout stages of this season’s Champions League.
He added: “It’s only October, we’ve lost a game, it’s not quarter-finals so in two weeks we have one more game and, of course, we will have to win two games from three to quality for the last 16.”
The Citizens are next in action when they play host to Southampton in the Premier League on Sunday.
Guardiola’s men are available at 1.50 to win the match, while the Saints are on offer at 7.00 and the draw is priced at 4.33.
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