PEP GUARDIOLA IS a great man for delivering some of football’s blatant truths.
So when he is asked by one travelling Norwegian journalist to compare Manchester City’s goalscoring cyborg, Erling Haaland, with Lionel Messi when they were at Barcelona, the Catalan is primed.
“Nothing is comparing. How many times has ‘the new Leo Messi’ appeared in the world football since I start? 10? 15 times? Erling has to do his own career, his own job. How many press conferences have we done here this year? Today? 50 questions and 45 for Erling. For me it is OK.”
For the sake of clarity, of the 37 questions asked over the course of 26 minutes, 19 related to Haaland. So, just one fewer than the number of goals he has scored for club and country so far this season.
Well, there were actually 20 if you include the one about his father Alfie who, according to reports in their native country, Guardiola was informed, now makes homemade lasagne for his son’s meal the night before each home game.
“Oh, we can make an offer so Erling’s father comes to cook for us,” the City boss quipped. “This is the secret for Erling’s goals! I’m going to convince [chairman] Khaldoon [Al Mubarak] to bring him here. But I think there’s not only one secret.”
And so, Guardiola used his pulpit beneath a beaming LCD screen of various sponsors to inform us of some more of the game’s obvious realities.
“I will tell you another secret [to our success],” he said at one point. “The reason why is the quality the players have. Otherwise you cannot win. You can run a lot, fight a lot, but you need to have quality.
“The success we have is because we have good players, top players. This is the secret. There is no more than that. The way we are playing, the last six, seven years, every year we are a little bit better.”
No sooner had he made this point than he stopped himself to change course.
“We cannot forget one thing, ladies and gentlemen,” Guardiola said, summoning attention like the modern-day preacher he is in a jet black Dsquared2 ICON hoodie.
There is one team that has been better than us [this season]. This is the reality. The reality is Arsenal have been better than us, so far. We are not top of the league. We want to be there, and we will fight to arrive there.”
A win over Southampton today will take them there, at least until the Gunners host Liverpool 24 hours later, and yet time and again the conversation reverted to Haaland.
“We are fortunate,” Guardiola continued. “The guys who are here accept it perfectly. There could be guys who would not like it but they accept it, guys who win four Premier League titles and fight for everything, but the talk is just ‘Erling, Erling’. Other clubs and people wouldn’t like it.
“Here it’s OK, because we have people like Kevin [de Bruyne] who is an exceptional person. The same for all of them. We don’t have players saying like ‘oh, why only people talk about just him?’ there are many clubs have them.
“It’s a joy to train these kind of players. It would be good if he [Haaland] continues this rhythm, but who knows? After the Community Shield people have a lot of doubts, now they have a lot of certainties. It’s just about this [game for Haaland]. Just go to the game and help to win the game with your mates.”
See, that simple.
And the brutal – blatant – truth is that’s what should happen on a weekend like this. The lack of high stakes on the pitch is one of the reasons steaks off it could be discussed when Guardiola, who co-owns a restaurant in the city, was asked for his response to captain Ilkay Gundogan’s wife decrying on social media the lack of decent places to eat in her adopted home
“Gundo will not play one more minute this season,” he deadpanned.
Southampton at home is the kind of fixture that now has a mundane aura of inevitability about it. Even if Ralph Hasenhüttl’s side did manage two draws last season.
“We struggle every season to try to control the game,” Guardiola sighed. “A brave team, so aggressive and well organised, it doesn’t matter what happened, they have a culture I like a lot.”
Close your eyes and it was like listening to an assessment of every Ireland team – club and country – from an opposing manager.
Stephen Kenny has been attempting to modernise the approach – backboned by those required qualities – but as Guardiola attested more is required to succeed.
Central to Kenny’s rebuild is Gavin Bazunu, and he returns to Manchester today following his £18 million move (a buy-back clause was included) for the kind of reunion that must surely be tinged with apprehension.
He has yet to keep a clean sheet this season and City have scored 20 times in their last four home games. Oh, and Haaland – incredibly – is aiming for a fourth successive hat-trick in front of his own fans in the Premier League.
Guardiola, though, remembers the kid who arrived from Shamrock Rovers in early 2019 just a couple of months before his 17th birthday.
Bazunu settled in his dorm on the sprawling Etihad Campus in east Manchester – with a poster of the Rovers team on his wall beside the Irish Proclamation of Independence – and trained with the first-team within months.
He pressed for a loan move to Rochdale in League Two heading into his second campaign, became a fixture with Ireland on the back of that, before a second stint away from City at League One Portsmouth last term led to him becoming a Premier League No.1 on England’s south coast.
“We were incredibly impressed before we loaned him last season. What impressed us was the personality that he has. How he communicates, how he guides the lines, the back four, the other people [around him],” Guardiola enthused.
He’s so brave. He is doing it and it’s not easy for any age. You know, he is a top, top goalkeeper and we were very impressed. He is another example that here, when the academy is over, going there [on loan] and after what he has done with the teams on loan, to get the opportunity to go to the Premier League.
“He is playing in the team because Ralph is not stupid. It’s because he knows that he can do it,” he added. “Every player, every one has their own personality. Gavin is built like that [to deal with pressure].
“There are keepers that are not communicating much and have other talents. This guy is a good keeper. He is living the game all of the time, he is shouting. I remember that perfectly when he was here. I said ‘wow, this guy is involved in every action’. I think this comes from himself.”
City’s head of goalkeeping, Xabier Mancisidor, helped to nurture those traits early on and the pair struck up a bond that remains strong. “Xabier is the best. Xabier is the best,” Guardiola repeated. “Tactically. The quality of the training sessions. Xabier is beyond good, beyond good.”
But, despite that praise and Bazunu’s blossoming talent, even Guardiola admits to being slightly taken aback by the speed of his rise to becoming a No.1 in the Premier League.
“We are a little bit. You know when you go on loan and then they get to the Premier League, to a team like Southampton and from the beginning be in their team. Yeah, surprised, but in the end it happened because the loan spells were good in these years.
“Surprised but not surprised by much because we saw him a lot. I remember we spoke with Xabier [about him] and he says ‘he’s really good’. I said ‘ok’, and some players they do their careers for themselves. At the end, it depends how they behave, how they perform will dictate the careers they are going to have.”
And so the last question was saved for joint-billing.
“Can Gavin Bazunu stop Erling Haaland from scoring today?”
“Yeah, of course,” Guardiola replied. “But hopefully it will not be this time.”
His last simple truth before departing.
