Pep Guardiola says that he “does not think” of “not reaching the stadium with direct elimination of the Champions League while he is preparing for an essential match against Club Brugge.
The 2023 champions had a poor first campaign in the format of new look and take place on the last day of Wednesday in 25th place.
The ninth to 24th teams enter a play-off tour, so the defeat against the Belgian team would mean the end of their European season.
Opta statisticians Give City a 63.8% chance of qualifying – while Brugge is likely to progress.
PEP 💬 (on John Stones) He played 35 minutes [against Chelsea] And played very well. Today we will see what he feels. pic.twitter.com/z0v7ff2hed
– Manchester City (@Mancity) January 28, 2025
Guardiola said: “The situation we have, we have to win the game and if not, we will not continue in competition and we want to spend another chance of playing two other games and qualifying for the next stage.
“It is not a problem, it is an opportunity, a challenge and we will face it.
“For the club, it would not be good not to qualify, but I don’t think about it for the moment. I know that for all the people concerned if we will qualify or not, I think we are going to do it. »»
City was great spending on the January market, spending around 125 million pounds Sterling for Omar Marmoush, Abdukodir Khusanov and Vitor Reis, but Guardiola says that he does not know how to progress in Europe would financially affect the club.
“I don’t know,” he said. “I haven’t talked to the CEO of this.
“In the last two or three transfer windows, this has always been positive. I am not naive enough not to know how important it is for the club financially for the club in this competition – it can affect the club, but of course, we want to try to do it first for sports reasons.
“Over the past five or six years, net expenses in this club have been incredible. The club said OK, the situation is the situation, if we want to spend, we can spend and otherwise we do not depend. »»
