It is not as famous a Pep Guardiola mantra as “Take the ball, pass the ball” but it is just as central to his coaching philosophy – a key pillar in constructing sides that rumble into record-breaking winning runs and compete for honours on all fronts.
Pep Guardiola said: “If they have bad faces, bad moods or want to show how disappointed they are, they will have big problems because they are not going to play,” he warned his City players in October 2018, five months after lifting the first Premier League title of his tenure. By the end of the season, City had retained their title and won an unprecedented domestic treble.
This does not mean Guardiola expects the unswerving obedience of “school boys”, as Zlatan Ibrahimovic once witheringly observed of his great Barcelona squad. But the intensity and relentlessness of what he demands from his players means unhappy players risk derailing everything. In the final weeks before the transfer window closed, this started to look like a problem.
Pep Guardiola said: “Not just Bernardo, there are two, three or four players that want to leave,” Guardiola said before the Community Shield when asked about Bernardo Silva ’s future at the club. But they are our players under contract and when they bring some offer and their agents come here and they want to leave, we are open to discuss absolutely everything. But it depends on them.”
Ultimately, the agents of those players were not able to come up with the goods. Gabriel Jesus and Aymeric Laporte were widely thought to be among the wantaway group after frustrating individual seasons in 2020/21. Jesus is a player revitalised and Guardiola has laid it on thick.
Pep Guardiola said: “He can play in three positions up-front, he does absolutely everything for his mates for one minute or 90 minutes – it doesn’t matter how many minutes he plays. That is why it’s a joy. I’m lucky that Manchester City got him for a good price when he was young.”
Laporte was the odd man out last season as Ruben Dias and John Stones forged a brilliant partnership at centre-back. This was the most obvious source of his disquiet. Guardiola has never gone out of his way to highlight Laporte as one of the “no bad faces” gang – as he has with Bernardo and Jesus – which feels kind of instructive.
