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Soccer tipsters Carragher on Guardiola: If City lose to Liverpool, title defense will be decided before Christmas. But it is precisely because of Pep that no one writes them off in the Premier League and Champions League
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Jamie Carragher has spoken out about the problems at Manchester City. The citizens have not won for six matches according soccer odds in a row, losing five of them. Tomorrow Manchester City will play against Liverpool in the away match of the 13th round of the Premier League. Guardiola has achieved so much in his coaching career that it seemed there were milestones he would never overcome. Nobody believed that the greatest manager of all time would ever look as vulnerable as everyone else in football.
The trials that all coaches go through, including the best ones, have always bypassed Guardiola. But now these difficulties seem to have overtaken him too.
Everyone who can be called the elite coaches of the Guardiola era - Jose Mourinho, Carlo Ancelotti, Jurgen Klopp - experienced such moments. Some of them could not cope with the crisis in one club and found their salvation in another.
But Guardiola`s genius has always been that he naturally and organically transformed one outstanding team into another, finding solutions to any tactical problem. When the history of our sport is written, he will be remembered as the greatest innovator and leader, and all others will be remembered only as followers.
Manchester City of the last eight years are a completely different team to the ones that won titles under Roberto Mancini and Manuel Pellegrini. Sometimes they were close to perfect, especially in the season when they won the treble.
Now, despite recent failures, no one will write off City in the fight for the championship [in the Premier League] and the Champions League. All because of one person - Guardiola. If anyone else had been at the helm, many would have believed that the club`s goal for the season would simply be to finish in the top four.
With a caveat, I will make a prediction: if City lose to Liverpool, their title defense will end before Christmas. The 11-point gap will become critical.
This does not mean that Liverpool are guaranteed to win the championship. Arsenal and Chelsea also have good chances. But City will need to show their form to put together another long winning streak, and given their current results it`s hard to believe they can avoid further defeats.
This match will be a key moment in the fight for the title. The difference between 11 and 5 points is psychologically huge. If City win and close the gap, everyone will be wondering: What was all the fuss about? - wrote the former Liverpool defender.
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