The Cityzens have a mountain to climb in the Champions League after slumping to a 3-0 defeat to Real Madrid in the first leg of their last 16 tie at the Santiago Bernabeu. Guardiola raised eyebrows with his team selection in the Spanish capital and saw his team simply swept away by Los Blancos, with Fede Valverde stealing the show for the hosts with a brilliant first half hat-trick.
Manchester City actually started the game strongly, with Jeremy Doku looking a real threat down the left flank, but were undone by two goals in seven minutes that put Real Madrid in charge of the tie by the half-hour mark. Thibaut Courtois' long ball forward to Valverde caught out Nico O'Reilly, allowing the Uruguayan to charge towards goal. Gianluigi Donnarumma came steaming out of his goal but could only watch in dismay as the Real Madrid midfielder touched the ball around him before poking into an empty net.
Valverde went on to add his second after good work from Vinicius Jr down the left. The Brazilian's pass took a nick off Ruben Dias and fell for Valverde to stride forwards and power a low shot across goal and past Donnarumma. There was more misery for City just before half-time as Valverde completed his hat-trick in some style. The midfielder touched the ball over Marc Guehi and then confidently slotted home to make it a miserable opening 45 minutes for the Cityzens.
Guardiola brought on Tijjani Reijnders for Savinho for half-time but the change had little impact and Real Madrid ought to have made it 4-0 early in the second half. Another long ball forward saw Vincius Jr running through on goal and brought down by Donnarumma for a penalty. The Brazilian dusted himself down to take the kick but was denied as Donnarumma dived to his left to block.
More changes followed as Guardiola sent on Rayan Ait-Nouri, Rayan Cherki and Omar Marmoush in a bid to try and find at least one goal to take back to the Etihad Stadium. Courtois saved well from O'Reilly in the closing stages but City couldn't find a way past the Belgian goalkeeper and head back to Manchester with their Champions League hopes hanging by a thread.
GOAL rates Manchester City's players from the Santiago Bernabeu...