Manchester City was scheduled to play Arsenal in midweek, but Pep Guardiola has made certain that his players have made the most of their time.
How did Manchester City react to their season-opening defeat?
Were there two training sessions? Exhausting runs? Pep Guardiola, on the other hand, gave his team two and a half days off to do whatever they wanted and go wherever they wanted in the world.
City players returned to training on Wednesday afternoon, rejuvenated after a brief respite from their colleagues and workplace. Kevin De Bruyne traveled to Paris with his family to collect the Ballon d’Or, Manu Akanji returned to Switzerland, and Phil Foden went to Manchester for a meal with his partner.
One of Guardiola’s most significant bits of man-management is to give his players time off whenever he personally can. It can lead to problems – such as when Sergio Aguero went to a concert in Amsterdam during some time off and then was involved in a car accident that sidelined him for six weeks – but the City manager has not dropped the policy.
He knows how exhausting it can be to have to be at 100 percent under him for every moment, and how exhausting and grueling the schedule can be where players end up seeing far more of their teammates than they do their families. While there are times when Guardiola will not allow any time off or will impose restrictions on what his players can do, there is nothing quite like the morale boost of a few days holiday.
The amount of time City stars get off has been envied before by players at other clubs, and despite losing to Liverpool there was no change in the plan for this week. The postponement of the Arsenal fixture gave the Blues six days between games, so the manager gave his side effectively the first half of the week off.
That is the trade-off of working under Guardiola: give absolutely everything you have in sessions and games, and you can spend any time there is to spare as far away from the coaching staff and training ground as you like. After Sunday’s defeat, all of the players have been allowed a reset before they start to prepare for Saturday’s match with Roberto De Zerbi’s Brighton.
This week has been the only free one remaining on the calendar before the World Cup, with City jetting off to Dortmund on Monday before traveling to Leicester next weekend, and further midweek matches against Sevilla and Chelsea mean that Brighton kicks off a run of seven games in 22 days before the break for the World Cup.
Whether or not the Arsenal postponement will end up being to City’s benefit in terms of when they face the Gunners, Guardiola has ensured that his players have an immediate advantage for the upcoming slog of games.
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