During Thursday’s 1-1 Boxing Day match with Everton, Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola repeatedly buried his face in his hands as he watched his team’s dismal run of terrible results continue.
With a rare early goal from Bernardo Silva, City looked to be winning at last, but Iliman Ndiaye tied the score and Erling Haaland missed a penalty kick, putting Guardiola’s team in sixth place.
“We have to bounce back mentally,” Guardiola said.
“Life is not easy. Sport is not easy. When that (penalty miss) happened, it’s okay, we still had a lot of minutes to play.
“A team like Arsenal and Chelsea could not score,” he added, in reference to Everton’s two previous games, both 0-0 draws.
“We created, we did it, and incredible how (City players) run and fight and do everything.
“Some games have not been good, but today, the case was it was well played, this is my feeling.
By the end of the day, City, who have only won one of their past 13 games in all competitions, might fall as low as seventh.
However, when questioned about his body language, Guardiola became agitated.
“No, it’s not true. My body language was positive, yes, because the team played really good. I’m not agreeing,” Guardiola said.
City has struggled with confidence, and both the team and the supporters at Etihad Stadium appeared to be lacking it on Thursday following Haaland’s failed penalty in the second half.
“But football is about winning, football is about you score goals and you don’t concede.
” The last month, month and a half, we are not able to do it.”
This season, Guardiola’s club has been plagued by injuries.
Jack Grealish sustained a slight injury during training earlier this week, and Kyle Walker was ill and missed Thursday’s game.
Given their opponents’ stellar reputation as four-time defending league champions and their desire to snap their recent slump in play, Everton manager Sean Dyche anticipated a fierce contest from City.
“I was worried about coming here today because it will change, at some point they will hurt someone,” Dyche said.
“But I felt we handled it well — the underlying feeling that they (City) pull a result out of the bag at some point.”
Late in stoppage time, Everton squandered a four-on-two break that would have given shock-stricken City their seventh defeat in nine league games.
