Pep Guardiola insists he has no regrets signing his new contract with Manchester City and claims he would have sleepless nights if he were to leave.
City have lost three of six games and won just one since Guardiola signed his new two-year contract during last month's international break. He is keen to overcome the biggest crisis of his 14-year coaching career and says he cannot leave City like this.
“Absolutely not,” he said defiantly. “I would regret leaving now. I wouldn't be able to sleep, even worse than now, if I thought I was leaving them in this situation. Impossible.
“They could fire me, that could happen, but leaving now has no chance. If my boss Khaldoon is not happy with me, they can do that. But if you stay in this position now, there is no chance. No, no, no.”
Guardiola will have spent 11 years at City when he completes his new contract and says he will resign when he feels he is done. He doesn't believe he has to give up like Sir Alex Ferguson, who retired in 2013 after winning Manchester United's record 20th Premier League title.
“When I feel it's time to leave, I will leave,” the City boss said. “What we did, we did. The satisfaction of doing it is over.
“I don't have any goals that would make my time here otherwise, impossible. I'm not saying I'll never leave until I win another Premier League or Champions League. That was achieved, the way we played, the numbers and everything. But now, in this situation, I couldn't leave.”
Guardiola knows City are hurting as they prepare to face United in today's Manchester derby at the Etihad and have lost seven of their last 10 games. He desperately tries to end their slump and is sure that moment will come.
Guardiola says it will be difficult to turn City around when he has so little time between games due to their crippling injury list.
“We are not the best at the moment because we don't have the players,” he said. “Otherwise we would be closer to Liverpool, my friends. But now maybe we'll realize how hard what we did was and of course we'll come back. When we come back it will be: Wow! We won't forget that moment because we want to and we can't.
“But I have to analyze the reasons for that a bit. There are things I have to train, I have to practice so that the players can improve. I need to practice, but when?
“Normally, when you have a match, the day after is recovery and they train the players who didn't play the day before. But we have seven, eight, nine players.
“We made a lot of mistakes, but we don't have time. We have to practice. To be a writer it is not necessary to read books; at least you need to practice writing a novel unless you are William Shakespeare! After that you don't need anything anymore.”
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