Pep Guardiola has issued a dire warning to his Manchester City rivals both domestically and internationally.
He has highlighted that Erling Haaland is in peak condition and aiming to improve even further. Guardiola remarked that if this doesn’t alarm Arsenal, Liverpool, Real Madrid, and Inter Milan—City’s Champions League opponents for Wednesday night—nothing will.
Haaland’s explosive start to the season has seen him score an unprecedented nine goals in his first four Premier League matches. His total since joining City from Borussia Dortmund in 2022 stands at an impressive 99 goals in 103 games.
He is just one goal away from surpassing Cristiano Ronaldo’s European record for the fastest player to score 100 goals for a club. The stats are astonishing, even for someone like Guardiola.
This is especially notable given that, as Guardiola himself pointed out with a grin, he managed only 11 goals throughout his playing career.
Guardiola said, “His numbers are surprising, a little bit, yeah. Do you know why? I played 11 years as a professional and I scored 11 goals. This guy, in four games, has nine. If you examine the next 100 games and he scores 99 goals, for me, it’s fine! Don’t improve. I will be more than delighted.”
“The difference to last season is he feels better. He came from Dortmund with a lot of muscular problems. He struggled a bit. So far (this season) he feels ‘I’m clean, I feel good here and have no problems’.”
“I don’t expect him every game to score three, two goals. It is not a problem, because I know the quality is there, but I think the difference from last season is he feels good.”
Guardiola recently watched a replay of City’s Champions League final win over Inter in Istanbul in 2023 with his squad. It was the first time he had revisited the historic match where Rodri’s second-half goal secured City’s first Champions League title.
Guardiola believes that Inter Milan remains a formidable team and will pose a significant challenge in their upcoming match.
He said, “It was a good team in that moment—and it’s a really good team right now. They always have been. The Serie A is a tough, tough league, so competitive, and this game will not be an exception.”
Despite revisiting that memorable victory, Guardiola maintains that the past triumph has no impact on Wednesday’s game.
He added, “About inspiration, about emotion, I’m so cold on that. It’s the first game in a group stage of eight games. Tactically, we have to be present in what we have to do.”
