Pep Guardiola has indicated that it may be harder for players to work their way back into the first team in the final months of the season.
Pep Guardiola said: “Rotation will be important but not like it is in September, October, November. The guys who are good and confident will continue to play. This is my feeling now.”
City have enjoyed the relative bliss of a full week between matches since their win over Newcastle last Saturday, and after a few days off the players returned to multiple days of training together that has left Guardiola feeling more like a manager again after February was spent almost entirely on the road. The group have maximised their time together in the knowledge that if all goes to plan they likely will not have another week like this where they can go into such details.
Pep Guardiola said: “We review things we cannot do when you play every three days: actions from set pieces, or actions that are annoying – not annoying but where you have prioritised one thing and then it is the other one. When you have a long week you can say ‘ok for a long time we haven’t spoken about this, let’s practise it. Three games are coming in a short time and after the international break if we go through in the knockout competitions – which hopefully will happen – April is so demanding as well. So we review things that we can do without losing our principles. The last month we had five games away, and spent ten minutes on the [training] pitch. There was no time to do anything.”
