Pep Guardiola is not concerned with Kevin De Bruyne’s mini drop in standards, telling his talisman to go back to basics. De Bruyne missed two games through illness and needed a personal word from the manager at half time on his City return at Bristol City for being ‘too passive’. After that, Guardiola said he was back to the ‘Kevin we know’, and he scored a beautiful curling effort from 25 yards at Ashton Gate. However, De Bruyne’s levels dipped again in the Premier League clash with Newcastle, and the Belgian was guilty of losing the ball on a number of occasions before being replaced by Bernardo Silva around the hour mark. De Bruyne has struggled for consistency for some time, even if his levels remain high, and Guardiola has backed his star man to rediscover his best in the coming weeks.
Pep Guardiola said: “Kevin, always the standards of Kevin are the sky. Everyone knows his level. In one week he has an opportunity to show his quality, delighted for the victory we had, this is what we have to do. Come back to principles, work hard. Everything will come back without any effort. Just do it your usual quality, your best.”
While De Bruyne has dipped below his best, Guardiola reserved praise for Bernardo, who replaced De Bruyne and scored the crucial second goal. Calling Bernardo a unique player in world football,
Pep Guardiola said: “Bernardo has never been a top top scorer or assists but he helps us to play better. You want statistics, okay go to big datas and congratulations you can write big articles about that. But there are things that people don’t come for the datas. Something that is unique, Bernardo is unique to make all of us play better, be aggressive and play our rhythm that we need to play to make us play better. The game in some moments is so quick, sometimes it is necessary, but sometimes not. Bernardo helps us to to play in a different pause to after make explosion. Bernardo is unique in the world to help us do this.”
