My Players Weren’t Clinical Enough Against Southampton – Pep Guardiola

Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola has praised his players for knocking out Southampton to reach an unprecedented fourth successive FA Cup final. Recall that Tonda Eckert’s team were heading for a shock victory via Finn Azaz’s 79th-minute strike, only for substitute Jérémy Doku equalised three minutes later before González’s long-range winner.

Reacting, even though his players created a lot of good chances in the second half, not taking the majority of them almost cost the team in the end.

Admitting that City now has six cup finals left to play this season, Pep urged his boys to be ready mentally and physically.

His words, “The team in the second half was really exceptional. The amount of chance, chance, chance after chance we created. We didn’t concede much in the second half.

We are not clinical enough, and then they scored the first.

What a goal by Southampton. Football is unpredictable, that’s why sometimes it’s: ‘Oh my God.’ How many times like in the second half did Southampton cross halfway?

Now six cup finals. Six games, every game we win in the league, we’ll be there – if we lose, it’s over and of course we have the other one – the Cup final.

We are in the Cup final again, we have time to prepare with our fans. Now it’s easy, so rest and mentally, physically, because it has been a tough, week, a lot of emotions and go for these five games.”

WOW.

Pep Guardiola Sala is a Spanish professional football manager and former player who is currently managing Premier League club Manchester City. Guardiola is the only manager to win the continental treble twice, the youngest to win the UEFA Champions League, and he also holds the records for the most consecutive league games won in La Liga, the Bundesliga, and the Premier League. He is considered to be one of the greatest managers of all time.

Guardiola has played for and advocated on behalf of the Catalonia football team. Between 1995 and 2005, he played seven friendly games for Catalonia.

Under Guardiola’s predecessor Frank Rijkaard, Barcelona were known for a 4–3–3 with plenty of flair with Ronaldinho being the centre point of the attack. Under Guardiola, however, the team became more disciplined with a greater focus on possession and a disciplined and aggressive pressing style.

Guardiola was born to Dolors and Valentí. He has two older sisters and a younger brother, Pere, a football agent. He is an atheist. Guardiola met his wife Cristina Serra when he was 18. They married on 29 May 2014.