An assured target for the treble winners.
Category
🥇
SportsTranscript
00:00 On to Manchester City, Michael. Obviously, the Champions League kicking off, they had a slight scare in that first half, but they managed to get the win in their first group game.
00:10 Just looking ahead, surely they're looking at this and they want to go and do what they did last season.
00:16 Yeah, and look, you would be a brave man to bet against them, I think. They are the best team in Europe, they are the best team in the world.
00:23 I don't think anyone doubts that. I just think that over a Champions League group season, the best team doesn't always necessarily win, given how knockout football works.
00:35 I think that, I mean, what's really interesting is Pep Guardiola is clearly, clearly thinking about this second Champions League.
00:41 I mean, that's the way his mind works. He's just got to go first and he's already thinking about the second one.
00:45 Even making those comments last night in the press conference about, "Oh, Nottingham Forest have won two, we've only won one."
00:52 And talking about, basically he said something along the lines of in his press conference the other day that,
00:57 "Lots of teams have won one Champions League, but not many teams have won multiple Champions League European cups."
01:04 And just kind of getting this mindset into the players, I thought it was quite interesting as well that he did say, though, that in his eyes, it would be easier to win the second one than the first one.
01:13 Again, it's just all how he motivates his players. And it's just so difficult, I think, to keep these, you know, Gary Neville, I know we've spoken about it a lot,
01:24 that United after they won the treble, the standards dropped massively. It was so difficult to keep that going and certain players eased off.
01:32 It's just, you know, Guardiola has assembled a fantastic group of players there who, you know, have won four out of five Premier League titles.
01:39 That comes from that easing off, but it is only natural that the motivation will drop a little bit.
01:44 So, yeah, listen, I think they're going to be in the latter stages once again.
01:48 I think they'll be amazed if they don't make it to at least the semi-final stage again this season.
01:54 I just think a couple of the questions are how they keep implementing the new players, how, I mean, at the moment they're not quite firing on all cylinders, which is fine.
02:02 City do tend to start slower and get better as the season goes on.
02:06 But it's just kind of, I suppose you'll want to see slightly improved performances as the season goes on and maybe implement, fully get these new signings,
02:15 although I think the new signings have started way out, just fully get them playing a little bit as they did last season.
02:20 But, yeah, I think they could, I think they've got every chance of winning the second Champions League this season.