Pep Guardiola
Manchester City were last night claiming a new top-flight record of 15 consecutive wins in all competitions, after seeing off Swansea in the FA Cup. But the Blues were, confusingly enough, also adamant that they had broken that particular record in 2017 – when they piled up TWENTY victories on the bounce on their way to a Premier League and League Cup double. Pep Guardiola, never a big fan of records, was asked about it afterwards, and praised his players for a little bit of history.
Pep Guardiola said: “It shows how special these players are, and we’re thinking about the next one. I know we broke a record for all time, now it belongs to us and this record will be broken for sure because the sport is like this.”
But Guardiola rightly put the 15-match winning streak in perspective. In the toughest of conditions, and with a game every four days on average, City have stormed to the top spot in the Premier League, into the League Cup final and now into the FA Cup quarter-finals.
Pep Guardiola said: “It means a lot, in this period, the toughest period – the Christmas time, the winter time, to do what we have done so far is quite remarkable. But the important thing is the way we’re still playing and our consistency, Now we’re thinking of the next ones. We have an incredible tough week ahead of us, and we’re going to approach it game by game.”
As for the record, City historian Gary James wrote to both the international lawmaking body Ifab, and the National Association of Football Statisticians to verify the 2017 streak as a bona fide record, even though it included a penalty shot-out win in a League Cup tie with Wolves. James got an answer from David Elleray, former technical director at Ifab and ex-Premier League referee, who said a penalty shoot-out win counted as a match win. And the stats people confirmed that, and said the 20-match run would be counted as the new record, having eclipsed the previous
