It was neither the most extreme or most expensive piece of scrambled thinking by anyone of a Manchester City persuasion. Yet as Pep Guardiola assessed a run of results that would have seemed beyond anyone’s comprehension, two months ago, there was a statistic he kept quoting. “When you lose eight of 10 at a big club,” he said. It is actually eight in 11, but that is scant consolation.
Where did it come from? Where does it end? Not against Manchester United. Just when City thought they were out of crisis, they pulled themselves back in. The managerial godfather blamed himself. “I am the boss, I am the manager, I am not good enough,” said a self-flagellating Guardiola. “That is the truth.”
