Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola has cautioned his players against being distracted by the possibility of closing the gap on Premier League leaders Arsenal, urging them instead to concentrate solely on their own performances.
Arsenal are not scheduled to play until Thursday, when they take on Brentford at the Gtech Community Stadium, meaning City could move within three points of the top with a win over Fulham on Wednesday.
City’s title challenge appeared to suffer a major setback on Sunday after Dominik Szoboszlai’s superb late free-kick put Liverpool ahead 1-0 at Anfield. However, goals from Bernardo Silva and Erling Haaland turned the match around, while Szoboszlai was later sent off for denying a clear goalscoring opportunity. That decision also led to Rayan Cherki’s spectacular goal from inside his own half being ruled out, which would have made it 3-1.
Despite City’s comeback victory, Opta’s supercomputer continues to rate Arsenal as clear favourites for the title, giving them a 90.5% chance of lifting the trophy. City’s chances, though, improved to 8.2% following their win on Merseyside.
Guardiola insisted his focus remains firmly on the immediate task ahead, saying:
“I understand how nice – is it nine points or three points – this kind of stuff is.
“That’s okay, but that does not equal winning titles or arriving in the latter stages to fight to win titles.
“Every time in the last month and last few weeks, when I go before the games for a flash interview, always if you lose, you are losing everything, and you are going to disappear from planet Earth and this kind of stuff.
“What I’m saying is what we have to do to beat Fulham, what we have to do to be better and to be closer to repeating the first half from Anfield, and not the second.
“What is the reason why, in the second half, we are still dropping our performance level?
“Not three, four, five or six [points], because if we don’t do that we will not win, maybe against Fulham, or maybe it’ll be against Newcastle or maybe in the next game at Leeds.”
City head into the Fulham clash with a formidable record, having won their last 16 Premier League meetings with the London club — the longest winning streak one team has enjoyed against another in English league history.
Across all competitions, City have also emerged victorious in the last 19 encounters between the two sides, another record run in English football.
