Champions League: Guardiola Urges Man City ‘To Stand Up’, Fight Again Next Season

Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola has urged his players to put behind them, the disappointment of losing to their 2019/2020 Champions League quarterfinal match to Olympique Lyon and get ready to fight as a stronger side in next season’s edition.

Guardiola’s men lost 3-1 to Lyon on Saturday, making it the third time in a
row that The Citizens have exited the competion in the Quarter-finals under Guardiola. They had bowed out in the Round of 16 before making the triple quarterfinal feats. And the wait for their first ever Champions League title continues.

Lyon scored first through Maxwell Cornet in the 24th minute before Kevin De Bruyne equalized for City in the second half – 69th minute. Moussa Dembele who replaced Memphis Depay in the 76th minute became the French team’s match hero, netting double in the 79th and 87th minutes.

“After the break we are going to start the competition again, will recover, we will restart it again and you know we try to do it again,” Guardiola told reporters during post-match press conference.

“Of course, I’m not able with these guys to break this line, the quarter-finals. So, three years in a row in that position, we are out.

“I think what these guys have done, they deserve to do it again, or to go through and go to reach the semi-finals but we are not able, but life is how you stand up again and next season we’re going to try again.”

Guardiola would not blame the match officials concerning Dembele’s first goal which was a bit controversial after the striker pounced on a through pass from Houssem Aouar to beat City’s goalkeeper, Ederson Moraes.

Guardiola said: “Listen, it happened many times in this competition but I don’t want to talk about it now, I am finding, or we are finding as a club, excuses .

“It is what it is, referee decides, the VAR decides in this instances, so.
We struggled in the first 15, 20 minutes to find the spaces to attack a little bit better with more consistency and after, the last 15, 20 minutes, they started to play really good, a team that’s so aggressive, defensively strong like all the French teams. In the second half we are good but not good enough.

“The distance is sometimes the chances we miss and after we concede the goals, so it is what it is. Maybe one day we will break this part, the quarter-finals, I’m not able, with these incredible guys, to do it. We are going to try in the future”

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