Pep Guardiola has warned his Manchester City players that he has a sixth sense for detecting players who think their job is done. The Blues can open a 15-point gap over second-placed Manchester United if they beat Wolves at the Etihad Stadium on Tuesday night, after the Reds were held by Chelsea and Leicester lost to Arsenal at the weekend, after they had chalked up a 20th consecutive win by beating West Ham 2-1.
Pep Guardiola said: “As much we win and get results, as much we have to demand and be over the players and say we can do better,” he said. This is the moment that when I feel everyone is thinking the job is done, these guys are not going to play. I am so intuitive to know when the guys are not going to continue. The champions are Liverpool, we are not. To do it we have to win eight, nine, ten games – it’s a lot. There are incredible teams who struggle to win four or five games. At the beginning of the season we were the same – we struggled to win three games in a row. I want more, and tomorrow is a good example to do it.”
Guardiola will be on top of his players in training, insisting they continue to improve, even though they have been fair close to perfection for the past two months. Asked how they can get better,
Pep Guardiola said: “Especially in the areas for the individual players we can improve, every player can improve in some details. Normally they work on the things, the qualities they have, they know what they have to do. Sometimes you have to improve when the right foot is better than the left foot, the first controls, the way you drive to make dribbles, the right and left. When every individual player can improve the team will improve. That’s why the team always can do better. That’s the target.”
And he said that his plays are well aware that there will be no slacking allowed.
Pep Guardiola added: “We know each other quite well and they know in the moment how demanding I am. Now the weather in Manchester is lovely and sunny but we don’t relax, for one second. Tomorrow is a tough game, Sunday against United, we saw against Chelsea how strong they are and there are still a lot of nice things to play for.”
