Manchester City manager believes his side were “pretty good” despite a few areas needing improvement
Pep Guardiola has insisted that Manchester City will not relent in their pursuit of league leaders Arsenal despite suffering a huge setback against Nottingham Forest.
Ahead of the match against Vitor Pereira’s side, City had their destiny in their own hands in the title race, as winning all of their games, or at least as many games as Arsenal, will have secured the title.
However, after the draw at the Etihad they now trail Arsenal by seven points, albeit with a game in hand. It means that even defeating Arsenal when they meet at the Etihad in April will not be enough, and they will require Arsenal to drop points in at least one other game.
But an undeterred Guardiola believes there is still time for his side to see the winds blow back in their favour.
“[There are] still many games to play, them one less,” Guardiola said. “Now it’s Newcastle [in the FA Cup] and I always think about what’s next.
“If we analyse then in general it was a good performance [against Forest] and there were many good things. Of course we have things we can improve but in general pretty good.”
City led twice through Antoine Semenyo and Rodri, but Forest hit back each time, Morgan Gibbs-White first producing an outstanding improvised finish to level early in the second half, before Elliot Anderson curled an impossibly sweet shot beyond Gianluigi Donnarumma late in the game to force the scores level again.
“There are games that maybe we don’t deserve it but today we played in general good for more than 90 minutes,” Guardiola said.
“Okay you cannot stop the transition or long balls; it’s not about this action or the other action. In general we played well. They were so defensive and are a really good team. We were dynamic.
“Maybe we missed contact with Erling [Haaland] and his incredible movements. We have to look for him a little bit more. But apart from that, in general it was okay.”
