Guardiola claims Manchester City’s dream of a double treble suffered heartbreak as they lost 4-3 on penalties to Real Madrid, while Arsenal were also thrashed 1-0 in the Champions League. “No regrets”.
City came from behind in the quarter-final second leg at the Etihad Stadium, with Kevin De Bruyne’s 76th-minute strike negating Rodrygo’s opener early in the first half. However, despite the defending champions dominating possession, Real held on until the end of extra time and eventually won on penalties.
Julian Alvarez scored the first penalty for Manchester City and Luka Modric missed it for the visitors. It felt like an early decisive moment but Bernardo Silva and Mateo Kovacic failed to convert City’s next two players. The remaining kicks were all successful, with Antonio Rudiger scoring the winning penalty for the 14-time champions.
Guardiola congratulated Real Madrid and said Manchester City should have beaten Real Madrid before the penalty shootout. “That’s the thing – sometimes you win on penalties, sometimes not. We should have done it before – because of the way we played,” the manager said. “I have absolutely no regrets – we did everything offensively and defensively. Football is about goals and they did a better job with penalties than us. They made it to the semi-finals and we didn’t. I have to speak from the bottom of my heart Thank you to my players from the bottom of my heart.
De Bruyne and Erling Haaland were substituted before the penalty shootout. “They asked me to do this – they couldn’t continue,” Guardiola explained.
Joshua Kimmich’s 63rd-minute header at the Allianz Arena saw Arsenal eliminated.Mikel Arteta described his dressing room as “destroyed”, adding: “I can’t find the right words to describe them and I hope I can. We have to go through it [this pain]. We competed against an experienced team, but looking at the draw I think the gap between the two sides was very small.
“There were moments when we were better. We gave them two goals [in the first leg], a big advantage was given up and today you can see the margin of error is zero, we made a mistake on defense and we admitted it. Then it becomes difficult. We tried a lot of different things, but they were all difficult. Now is the time to stay with the players and support them because they are the ones taking us on this journey.
Guardiola must now select his players for Saturday’s FA Cup semi-final against Chelsea, while Arsenal, two points behind Manchester City in the Premier League, travel to Wolves on the same night.
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Guardiola said: “We will see how the players perform tomorrow.” Arteta said: “Everything is good ahead of us. There are six games left – a busy schedule for everyone. Week Four – Get up and come in with the same attitude we had when we came here and hopefully beat the Wolves.
