Manchester City needs a point on the last day to guarantee their place in the Champions League of next season while the men from Pep Guardiola go to Craven Cottage to prevent Fulham
Pep Guardiola insists that he will only be assessed for the results – and admitted that this is willing to change his football philosophy if it would guarantee that Manchester City needs the qualification of the Champions League.
City starts in third place in the last day and with a superior target difference on Newcastle, Chelsea, Aston Villa and Nottingham Forest – but a defeat in Fulham would open the door for all four of their rivals to catch up.
After a week that Ruben Amorim's refusal to change his beliefs, led to a final defeat of the Europa League and more doubts about his future of Manchester United, Guardiola is not illusions that he will be assessed whether the city can get over the line.
Guardiola said: “The manager is good if you win – if you don't, his decisions are wrong. Every plan when you win, that is really, really, really good. We are judged on our results, not the way we want to approach the game.
“I thought it may not be the case after many, many years. But a manager is really, very good if he wins … If he doesn't, then he has problems.
“If we have to play in a certain way to take a point, then I will do it. If that means it has to change the principles, lean back and wait for the transition and play another way to take the point, then I will do it. I promise you will do it.
“If I think that is the best way to take a point or the three, then I will do it. We must respect what we have to do during the 90 minutes or 95 minutes.
“For me my idea is to try to play the game. But if we play badly or play the opponents better than we do, I will change. You have to play to score and win games, but if we have to defend 90 minutes to get the result that is what we will do.”
City was the last time to qualify for the Champions League in 2010 – and two years ago they became European champions for the first time. Last week the blues were defeated by Crystal Palace in the FA Cup final and will now end without a trophy since the end of Guardiola's first season in Manchester in 2017.
The Catalan accepts that there will be consequences if his team suffers a new defeat in the capital – but it said that it will not be a fatal blow to the future.
Guardiola said: “After the end of the season we will decide what we have done with the process, what we can do more carefully, what happened, what we should have expected with our decisions and what we should do for the best future.
“It will be easier to do that when we are in the Champions League.
“If we are not eligible, we will survive. We will go further and we will make the decisions we have to make. But the club, I am pretty sure it thinks best. I know the season has not been good – but it can always be worse, right? So we just have to concentrate on what we should do in the game.
“For the big teams it is always the case, how you come up every time the situation is not perfect. That's what we have to do.”
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