Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola was delighted with the introduction of Nico O'Reilly and joked the youngster would definitely start the semi-final
Pep Guardiola
Pep Guardiola
Pep Guardiola said he will 'always regret' not giving more minutes to some of his homegrown stars this season after watching Nico O'Reilly send Manchester City to Wembley. City were losing 1-0 to Bournemouth at half-time when the 20-year-old came on and changed the game with two assists.
It was a performance that left the City boss delighted for his 'legendary players'. Bernardo Silva, Mateo Kovacic, Kevin De Bruyne and Ilkay Gundogan all started despite concerns about their ability to match Bournemouth for legs in midfield.
Guardiola revealed afterwards that this had been a deliberate plan not to match their hosts, but to force City to play the game that has earned them so much success. It wasn't looking like it would work though until O'Reilly came on for Abdukodir Khusanov at half-time, prompting the manager to wonder aloud about whether he should have trusted them more in the difficult times the team have had.
"I learn from my period in Barcelona and here where there are a lot of academy players that they have one incredible attribute: they are not scared," he said.
"They adapt so quick. Always when I see [James] McAtee or Nico or Rico [Lewis] I always think why I didn't allow them in this bad season to play minutes? Always I will regret a bit myself because there are players who deserved more minutes because when they played the impact was really good.
"But sometimes seeing the tough moments it puts a lot of pressure on them. Maybe it's wrong, because the young players know the environment and the style and that's why it's easy."
After talking about the biggest problem this season being the lack of heart and passion in the team since they lost to Bournemouth in the Premier League last season, Guardiola was asked what had gone wrong for that to happen. The City boss listed his own performance among the reasons, and hopes that Sunday's game can be a turning point for the team for the rest of the season.
"It was many things. I put Pep first on the list," he said. "I should have taken decisions I didn't take in the right moment.
"If it was just one, it would be easy. Incredible injured players. Many many many things happened. We tried to solve it but I was not able to find a solution to bounce back quicker.
"Bournemouth are a fantastic team and if they had gone through I would have said congratulations but we would have lost the way I like. In Nottingham Forest, was it like the team that played today? No. Hopefully until the end we can change and learn from that and prepare for next season."
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