\n<\/p>\n
Pep Guardiola has said the Premier League title race will be “over” if his <\/b>Manchester City<\/b> side drop points at <\/b>West Ham<\/b> on Saturday.<\/b><\/p>\n
Second-placed City sit seven points behind leaders Arsenal though with a game in hand – nine games remaining compared to Arsenal’s eight. The sides also meet in a potentially pivotal fixture at Etihad Stadium on 19 April. <\/p>\n
However, Guardiola is not looking beyond this weekend, saying: “Now it’s West Ham. The Premier League is the most difficult title. <\/p>\n
“We’re still there, knowing that if we drop points it will be over.<\/p>\n
West Ham are battling at the other end in the table and find themselves in the relegation zone, below 17th-placed Nottingham Forest on goal difference only.<\/p>\n
However, their results have improved lately and the Hammers have lost just one of their past five Premier League matches.<\/p>\n
Guardiola knows Nuno Espirito Santo’s side are fighting for points, but the Spaniard said City “are desperate too”.<\/p>\n
“I’ve always said when we arrive in the last 10 games every team plays for something – for relegation, for Europa League, for Conference League, for Champions League, to be champions. It’s normal, every game,” Guardiola said.<\/p>\n
“Now there are no second chances.”<\/p>\n
Guardiola did not want to dwell on Wednesday’s 3-0 defeat by Real Madrid in the Champions League last-16 before their trip to London Stadium.<\/p>\n
“Tomorrow night, we have a game, an important one for the Premier League position. Then we have the second leg,” he said on Friday.<\/p>\n
City, who lost in the knockout play-off round in the Champions League last season, will host Real Madrid in the return leg on Tuesday.<\/p>\n
“It is a pleasure to be here. Last season we could not reach this stage, so it is nice,” Guardiola added.<\/p>\n
The City boss defended his team selection and tactical decisions in the Bernabeu after he was criticised for an attack-minded line-up.<\/p>\n
“This is not the first time I’ve been hurt. I’ve lost many times in the Champions League at all stages – many, many, many times – and have been massacred for decisions and what happened,” the 55-year-old said.<\/p>\n
“My argument or reason [to] justify the team selection – it’s because I lost, we lost the game. But if you win, ah, ‘genius’. How many times have I heard, ‘Pep is a genius’ for the team selection?”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n
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Pep Guardiola has said the Premier League title race will be “over” if his Manchester City side drop points at West Ham on Saturday. Second-placed City sit seven points behind leaders Arsenal though with a game in hand – nine games remaining compared to Arsenal’s eight. The sides also meet in a potentially pivotal fixture<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":10527,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-10526","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-football"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10526","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=10526"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/10526\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/10527"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=10526"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=10526"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/outdoorthrill.cfd\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=10526"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}