The Man City boss admits he does not know what impact the Club World Cup will have on the coming season
Pep Guardiola
Man City boss Pep Guardiola
Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola does not know what toll the Club World Cup will have on his players for the coming season, but admits it could be a disaster.
City and Chelsea are the two Premier League sides competing in the controversial tournament this summer, with both progressing to the latter stages.
Guardiola's men face Al Hilal in the last 16 in the early hours of tomorrow morning and are expected to get through to the quarter-finals, while Chelsea will face Palmeiras in the last eight next weekend.
There will be precious little recovery time for his squad after the tournament, before they have to prepare for the Premier League campaign, with many of his players also having one eye on next summer's World Cup.
Newcastle United and their Premier League rivals will be monitoring the situation closely, with the race for the Champions League places again likely to be a hard-fought contest next term.
England head coach Thomas Tuchel has already said Newcastle, Liverpool and Arsenal could have an advantage over City and Chelsea due to their summer exertions.
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City are no strangers to competing on many fronts, but even an experienced manager like Guardiola admits they are entering unknown territory.
“After this, let’s see what happens," he said. "We can rest and take the time that the Premier League has allowed us to rest and then we will see.
"Maybe in November, December or January it will be a disaster, we are exhausted and the World Cup has destroyed us. I don’t know but it’s the first time in our lives that this has happened.
“Mentally I think in the past the players have played in World Cups or European Championships for their national teams so it happens sometimes. You need a rest mentally sometimes, you can recover and then we will see when we come back.
"But I try not to think about it otherwise I would get too anxious. Instead, I try to relax, enjoy the days here and the good vibes that we have. The most important thing is to recover to find within ourselves what we were. That’s my main target in this tournament.
“I want the players to rediscover themselves, to visualise the way we play when they train, play like we can in those training sessions and then take that into the games so they can say: ‘Oh, this is what we were.’
“I want them to feel that this is our path again to be competitive like we have been in eight of the last nine years. That was incredible and this is the main target from the competition.
“I was really pleased to go through against Juventus but more important is the fact that the players can visualise that they can do it again, they can compete again, be a competitive team again and be that incredible, fantastic and aggressive team that we have been.
“They have been amazing and they have already shown that against Juventus who are an amazing team who went out of the Champions League in the quarter finals and they have an incredible team and squad.”
Newcastle don't face Man City until November 22 at St James' Park, with the return fixture at the Etihad scheduled for February 21, 2026.
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