Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola has explained why he chose to substitute Erling Haaland following their 7-0 obliteration of RB Leipzig in the Champions League on Tuesday night.
The Sky Blues slotted seven goals past the Bundesliga side to progress to the quarter-finals of the one competition that has eluded Pep since he arrived in Manchester, with Haaland grabbing a first-half hattrick and then another two all in the space of 35 minutes. Sheesh.
Even before finishing five, Haaland’s hattrick saw him break the record for the youngest player to reach 30 goals in the Champions League (22 years, 236 days), beating fellow young phenomenon Kylian Mbappe by 116 days. However, his manager chose to sub him off before he could reach another.
Speaking to media afterwards, Pep explained that beyond giving him a rest or making sure he didn’t pick an unnecessary injury, he chose to withdraw Haaland because the game was over and he wanted “[them] to play”, as well to avoid any unreasonable criticism given the ridiculous bar he has set himself.
The 52-year-old went on to explain that while his numerous hattricks this season and now five goals in one game are obviously thrilling, “the problem is every time we don’t score two or three he will be criticised. This is the reality.”, insists Pep.
Unfortunately for City fans and neutrals alike watching on in disbelief, if Haaland had stayed on and scored just one more — a double hattrick (silly that they were even considering these phrases) — he would have beaten Lionel Messi and Luiz Adriano’s record for most goals in a single UCL match.
Alas, it wasn’t to be and while many joked that the Spaniard was protecting Messi‘s record by not letting his star man score six (Pep insisting he had no idea of the stat), even he quipped that “if he achieves this milestone at 22, 23, it will be boring his life. He wouldn’t have a target to reach in the future.”
The goals began to dry up after the Norwegian number nine was hooked off and one thing’s for sure, he certainly didn’t want to be taken off, noting to BT Sport that he told Pep when he went off, “I would love to score a double hattrick, but what can we do? I have to go”.
Ah well, he still managed to reach multiple milestones on the night. As well as becoming the youngest to reach 30 UCL goals, he also did it in the fewest amount of games in history (25), beating Ruud van Nistelrooy who did it in 30.
As if that wasn’t enough, his fifth goal also saw him well surpass Tommy Johnson for the most goals scored by a City player in a single season (38), not to mention the only player to ever score that amount in the Champions League for the club and just third player to ever do so in the tournament.
Truly unbelievable stuff.
Now on 39 goals and five assists in just 36 games across all competition this season, our early season prediction of Haaland scoring more than 50 goals now seems almost too conservative. The better question is how many records will he end up breaking before the year is out?
Man City now progress into the Champions League quarter-final yet again with the draw set for 11am on Friday, 17 March. They could face any one of the following teams:
Chelsea
Benfica
Milan
Bayern Munich
Inter
Napoli/Frankfurt
Real Madrid/Liverpool
Guardiola was once again asked if he thinks his side can finally win their first Champions League, having admitted earlier in the week that he will be judged by many “as a failure” if he does not win it.
In a rather unusual moment, Pep said that even winning wouldn’t make up for the time his “idol” Julia Roberts came to Manchester and watched United over City in 2016. Guess he’s just a really big Pretty Woman fan?…
Pep Guardiola hints at when Manchester City fans can expect to see their latest arrival
Danny Jones
Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola has given supporters a rough timeline as to when they can expect to see their new signing, or at least their latest arrival, make his first appearance.
The Blues wrapped up the January transfer window with four major signings: their new attacking number seven, Omar Marmoush (who has already bagged a hattrick on his home debut) promising defensive duo, Abdukodir Khusanov and Brazilian Vitor Reis, as well as their ‘mini-Rodri’, Nico Gonzalez.
However, the club has had another late arrival who was technically signed back at the start of last year but who has spent for the last 12 months or so loaned back to his previous parent club, River Plate in Argentina, waiting to make the move over to the Etihad Stadium – and now he’s here in Manchester.
Speaking on his touchdown in 0161, Pep said Claudio Echeverri won’t be thrown into first-team action straight away but did give a rough estimate as to when City fans could expect him to get involved. You can see him discussing the integration plan in his post-match press conference following the Spurs win.
The mention was only brief but there’s still plenty of reason for Man City fans to be excited by the late January signing.
“Yeah, he [Claudio Echeverri] is going to start to train and mainly will be for the end of the season, maybe the [Club] World Cup and as soon as possible [that] he arrives he can adapt quick for the future.”
As mentioned, the 19-year-old Argentinian attacking midfielder from Resistencia officially put pen to paper with CFG back in January 2024 and was quickly dubbed ‘the next Messi’.
Now, although the football world is often quick to jump the gun with these things and he isn’t the first and certainly won’t be last to be slapped with this premature title, he’s done more to back up these claims since then than he has rubbish them.
Starring at the 2025 Under-20 South American Championships, netting six goals in nine games to finish the tournament as the second highest scorer thanks to notable braces against Brazil and Uruguay as the young Argentine’s finished as runners up.
He also notched 48 senior appearances for River Plate thus far, netting four goals and grabbing eight assists in that time, not to mention having already captained his national team at the 2023 Under 17s World Cup, where he scored another five.
Safe to say there’s plenty of talent to be tapped in this lad.
Once again, Echeverri won’t go straight into the senior set-up for a little while yet, barring a major injury crisis, but he’ll be a more than exciting addition to the City Football Academy and for future first-team lineups for years to come.
Who knows, maybe he’ll be included in an FA Cup matchday squad? Nevertheless, you can expect him to not just come of the bench but hopefully show what he can do at the Club World Cup this summer.
City‘s first fixture as reigning champions of the competition will be against Moroccan side Wydad AC on 18 June 2025.
You can watch Echeverri’s first full interview as a Man City player down below:
The new Man City signing is excited to be finally be part of the club 13 months on from agreeing his contract.
‘Nothing is eternal’: Is Pep Guardiola hinting at the end of Manchester City’s supremacy?
Danny Jones
Pep Guardiola looks to have suggested that more than a decade of Manchester City’s supremacy and Premier League dominance at the very least might be coming to an end.
Speaking in his post-match press interviews after City were knocked out of the Champions League by serial European Cup winners Real Madrid, Guardiola cut a somewhat more deflated figure than usual following the 3-1 defeat.
A Kylian Mbappe hattrick which was closed out within an hour of play was enough to stretch the aggregate score to 6-3 over the two legs and Madrid doubling their lead across the tie proved yet again why, not unlike City domestically over the last decade, they’re the kings of the continental competition.
In contrast, however, Pep seemed to accept the loss much more easily than perhaps we’ve seen in the past and rather than appearing familiarly frustrated or defiant in the press conference; instead, he seemed rather reflective, responding to one reporter: “Nothing is eternal”.
🗣️ "Nothing is eternal" – Pep Guardiola.
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Insisting that they have to decide whether a significant rebuild is needed to keep competing at the very top level consistently as they have done since the 54-year-old arrived back in 2016, he argued that it is only with that they’ll be able to determine what comes next.
As for the result itself, he made no bones about Carlo Ancelotti’s side having “deserved it”, stating simply that “the best team won” and that fans and players alike have to “accept the reality: they were better.”
Having been a familiar foe for Pep long before he arrived in Manchester, both at Barcelona and Bayern Munich – not to mention City having faced Los Blancos a dozen times before Tuesday night since 2012 – there have been less surprising outcomes for supporters to come to terms with.
“With time, the club and everyone is going to accept what it is but for now we have 30/40 games for the Premier League next season to try and be here [in the Champions League] and to improve. Nothing is eternal”, said the Catalan coaching genius.
On the other hand, he also went on to add that it was merely a reflection on the night itself and not what his team have achieved in recent years.
He went on to remark that “when we were playing outstanding it hurt more” to be knocked out of the UCL when he felt they deserved to stay in it, but still insisted: “We have been unbelievable and we have to try step by step to get better from today.” Tonight just wasn’t the night.
Who knows? Perhaps it was just some more melodrama from a manager with an undeniable flare for pageantry and playing into/in the face of narratives when he doesn’t come out on top – which hasn’t happened all that often until their dip in form this season.
Plus, there’s certainly still plenty for him and the fans to be positive about; not only has the arrival of their ‘Egyptian Prince’ and the media’s Mo Salah successor, Omar Marmoush, got plenty of people excited – especially after that first-half hattrick against Newcastle – but so too have the other January signings.
In fact, for all of his downplaying in this particular presser (which you can hear in full HERE), it felt like there were only upsides after their victory over Newcastle, even going so far as to dub new signing Nico Gonzalez a ‘mini-Rodri‘.
You can watch the highlights from the game down below:
Pep is right, nothing is eternal – but sometimes you just come up against talents like Mbappe and there’s very little anyone can do about it.
Danny Jones -
15th March 2023 
