Pep Guardiola speaks out on Chelsea style as Enzo Maresca pinpoints ‘good thing’ in Man City thumping

Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola has had his say on the new Chelsea style under Enzo Maresca after his side put the Blues to the sword in a pre-season friendly.

City cruised to a 4-2 victory over the Blues on Saturday evening in Ohio, with Erling Haaland scoring a hat-trick, but it was once again a case of individual errors proving costly for Chelsea in pre-season.

But Guardiola has faith in his former assistant manager, insisting it’s clear what Maresca is trying to do.

Speaking after City’s emphatic victory, he said: “At Stamford Bridge, this would not happen.

“Let me say this, I see what Enzo wants to do and I like it. And I don’t just say that because he’s my friend.”

Chelsea mistakes and their obsession with playing out from the back played a part in each of City’s four goals.

Tosin Adarabioyo gave up possession in his own box before Haaland was brought down by Levi Colwill for a penalty, which the Norwegian converted.

Moises Caicedo than passed the ball to Haaland for the second before Raheem Sterling and Malo Gusto should have done better for the third and fourth of the game.

Sterling and Noni Madueke came off the bench to half the deficit but it was a game which highlighted the gulf between the two sides with the Premier League season just days away.

Speaking after the defeat, Maresca said: “I don’t have any doubt in terms of the progress the team is doing at the moment.

“The mistake is part of the process. I knew City for many years, even in friendly games, they don’t concede chances or possession but in the first half, I don’t remember them making six or seven passes in a row. So that is a good thing.

“I’m not concerned because we need time to understand the moments. It’s just about when you concede and you are on the pitch, you need to talk to each other and say, ‘Guys, we conceded’ and try to organise a little bit.

“That is exactly what I said. After the second goal, I called Reece [James] to the bench and I told him, ‘Okay, now we start the game and try to do things in a different way because we conceded two goals’. If you review the first-half, apart from the first five minutes, nothing to say.”

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Maresca agreed with a suggestion that the poor condition of the pitch at the Ohio Stadium contributed to a couple of errors, but didn’t want to use it as an excuse.

The 44-year-old continued: “Sometimes when we say something it sounds like an excuse so I do not want to say this but for sure, the pitch doesn’t help. With the way we like to play, the pitch needs to be quick but it was slowing it down.

“In this moment, we need to learn things. Probably more than the goals we conceded, we need to learn that when you concede one, you cannot concede one and then after two minutes another one.

“This is something that I just said to the players; we need to learn. When we concede one, we need to become stronger so we don’t concede another one.”

Pressed on whether that is a psychological problem, Maresca responded: “That’s why I said in this moment, sometimes we need to understand a bit better when we go back, when we play inside or outside, this kind of things.

“After three or four weeks, it is completely normal. Apart from the first four or five minutes, the game, for me, was good.”