Guardiola aims dig at ex-Man Utd stars after Man City criticism

 

Man City manager Pep Guardiola has hit out at former Manchester United stars Patrice Evra and Dimitar Berbatov for their criticism of his side following their elimination from this season's UEFA Champions League. The 51-year-old has opined that the pair are in the wrong for talking about the lack of personality in his City side, pointing out the fact that they were on the Manchester United side that received the drubbing against his Barcelona team in the 2009 and 2011 Champions League finals.

Last week, City were dumped out of the Champions League semi-final at the Bernabeu after Rodrygo inspired Real Madrid to a historic remontada. In the last three minutes of normal time, a double by the young Brazilian attacker tied the scoreline on aggregate before Karim Benzema got the winning goal for the Merengues after earning a spot-kick in extra-time.

The manner in which the Premier League champions lost the encounter raised questions and drew a lot of reactions across the football fraternity. In the aftermath, Patrice Evra claimed Man City lacked leaders because Guardiola "can't train people with personality" whereas Dimitar Berbatov alluded that it was the capitulation of a "small team". The claims of the pair have not been received in good faith by Guardiola.

After recording back-to-back big wins over Leeds and Wolves, the Spanish coach has responded to the pair, saying: "It's the same character and personality that we lost in Madrid in the last two or three minutes.

"Former players like Berbatov, Clarence Seedorf and Patrice Evra and these types of people were there, and I played against them. I didn't see this kind of personality when I destroyed them, we destroyed them, in the Champions League final against United.

"It's the same character and personality. You cannot have personality because we conceded two goals in one minute when we have two chances to score?

"And after the last four games, we score 22 goals, and we have an incredible personality."

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