UPDATE 1 – SOCCER – Guardiola says better team wins after Man City lose to Southampton

UPDATE 1 – SOCCER – Guardiola says better team wins after Man City lose to Southampton

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SOUTHAMPTON, England (Reuters) – Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola took a scathing assessment of his side’s performance after their 2-0 League Cup defeat to Southampton on Wednesday.

The competition has long been dominated territory by City, who have won the Cup six times since 2014, but it is only the second time in the same season that they have been knocked out before the semi-finals.

For the third time in Pep Guardiola’s tenure as City manager, and for the first time since 2018, his side failed to even shoot on target.

“That’s why we didn’t do well,” he told Sky Sports when asked about the stats.

Southampton scored two goals half an hour ago and defended well to limit City’s chances despite only having 28% possession.

Guardiola gave a candid analysis of the team’s performance on BBC Radio 5 Live, saying: Overcome, we didn’t do it.

“When you’re not ready to play this game, you arrive an inch behind and you can’t score. If you’re ready, you score.

“Today was a bad night. Our opponents were better and we have to congratulate them. To win the game you have to deserve it and tonight we didn’t deserve it,” Guardiola said. Joao Cancelo, Jack Grealish, Ilkay Gundogan and Calvin Phillips were listed as starters, but apart from an early shot that was dragged out wide by midfielder Gundogan, they made little impact on the game. rice field.

Guardiola’s sentiments were echoed by Gundogan, who was disappointed with the team’s performance.

“It’s definitely not what we wanted,” the German told Sky Sports. was not sufficient for

“We made a lot of mistakes with the ball, missed a lot of passes and gave the ball too easily, which resulted in two goals.

“Today we weren’t good enough to create chances and not good enough to score goals. The mix of performances from all the teams delivered this result.”

Guardiola says City have no chance of winning Saturday’s Manchester derby in the Premier League if they repeat Wednesday’s performance.

A resurgent Manchester United have won 15 of their 18 games since humiliating City 6-3 in October, with eight wins in all competitions.

“Of course, this is another competition, but when you perform in this way, you don’t stand a chance,” he said. “I know their (United) momentum.

“For years they’ve looked forward to being in this position. We know exactly what to do to play better and we’re going to do it.. We weren’t even close to our condition today.” (Reporting by Adam Millington; additional reporting by Hritika Sharma, Bangalore; editing by Toby Davis and Kenneth Maxwell)

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