PEP GUARDIOLA has slammed Gary Neville and Jamie Carragher in a bitter put-down after Manchester City were accused of being complacent.
And the angry Treble–winning Etihad boss also took aim at his club’s former player Micah Richards too in a show-us-your-medals blast.
Former Manchester United skipper Neville claimed City were letting their bid for a fourth successive Prem title slide after last Sunday’s 3-3 meeting with Tottenham.
He said: “What he won’t like, Guardiola, is [the] decision, the complacency, defensive lapses and giving up points again to Tottenham.”
His fellow Sky Sports pundit Richards added: “Something’s just not right, too easy to play against on counter, individual mistakes again.”
But Guardiola, bidding to become the first manager in history to win four top-flight crowns, sneered: “Maybe I’m wrong but it’s not about complacency.
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“I know the players, I know how they run. How we behave is extraordinary.
“I have a feeling that if we maintain that level, we’ll win the Premier League. We will win it again.
“He knows how difficult it is otherwise Gary Neville would’ve won four Premier Leagues in the best period of Manchester United.
“But he didn’t do it, you know?
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“Jamie Carragher didn’t win one once. Micah Richards didn’t win four Premier Leagues in a row.
“Never, ever. It’s never happened. There is more chance of it not happening than happening.
“Just one Treble before us. It’s so difficult to do it again and again.
“We don’t have what others have, who haven’t done it for many, many years.
“Normally it happens that when you drop points, people say : ‘OK you drop points, against Liverpool, Chelsea and Tottenham – what a disaster.’
“It’s Chelsea, Liverpool and Tottenham – what do people expect? That we get 120 points and be 20 points in front?
“Of course our behaviour in some moments, after winning the Treble and three leagues in a row, you need sometimes to defend a cross more aggressively, how we attack a ball.
“They are the little details. It happens. They come because we won a lot.”
Guardiola, who leads his side tomorrow tonight against Aston Villa, rejects suggestions that three successive draws means standards are slipping in his team – that will be without Rodri and Jack Grealish with doubts over Jeremy Doku.
Villa could go above City into third place but the City manager declares: “We talk a lot about how we still need to be there.
“But I saw how we pressed Tottenham, the game against Liverpool, even against Chelsea.
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“How we’ve done doesn’t give me the feeling that we say, ‘Look how good we are’ or we play a little bit naïve or play like we don’t respect the opponents.
“Not at all. I don’t have that feeling.”
Source: Soccer - thesun.co.uk
