Pep Guardiola admission speaks volumes as Man City dealt hammer blow in Liverpool title race

Manchester City boss Pep Guardiola has shouldered the blame for his team's shocking defeat at the hands of Manchester United over the weekend. Despite taking the lead with a Josko Gvardiol header, City succumbed to a late penalty by Bruno Fernandes and a subsequent winner from Amad Diallo.

This marked City's eighth loss in their last 11 matches across all competitions. Guardiola, speaking post-match, refused to criticise his players and instead took responsibility for the poor run of form. He commented: "Not much to say. No defence, they were incredibly persistent. We have not lost eight games in two seasons. We can't defend that. It's not about this or that player.

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"We gave away goals, our fault. We don't play with composure. The results are not good, the game was not exceptional. I know the situation, I understand but the reality is this. They have to know that these situations happen.

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"In the box you have to be careful. It's not about Matheus [Nunes], he played really good in not his position at full-back. But it's not about that, we have to play better. The result will help us to take our best but right now we don't have it. The way I learn is to keep going."

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Guardiola has openly admitted his struggles in finding solutions for City's faltering Premier League title defence, stating: "I'm not good enough. I am the boss, the manager, I have to find solutions and so far I haven't. That's the reality. We want to play better, create chances. But at the moment it's not possible."

With City now languishing in fifth place and trailing Liverpool by nine points with a game more played, fans are questioning what's going wrong at the Etihad.

Meanwhile, Bernardo Silva didn't hold back in his assessment of the team's performance, telling Sky Sports: "We deserved what happened. At this level a game or two is unlucky. We can't say this is lucky or unlucky - 10 games it's not about that.

"Minute 87 in a derby, winning 1-0 and our corner ends in a penalty for them, if we make these stupid decisions with three or four minutes to go you deserve to pay for that. Looking at the game I think there was only one team that could win the game, but at the end we lost."

Silva also reflected on the team's recent string of poor results, adding: "It's not one game, it's a lot of games lately. We have to look at ourselves. You can say oh, it's a bit unlucky, no. It's the decisions you make. Today, in the last minute, we played like under-15s."

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