As you’d expect, Pep Guardiola is taking this quadruple push rather seriously.
With Manchester City already winning the League Cup this season, they reached the FA Cup final over the weekend after edging past Brighton at Wembley.
There is no rest for the wicked, as City are straight back at it on Tuesday as they have the smaller matter of a UEFA Champions League quarterfinal first leg at Tottenham.
City have five days less rest than Spurs heading into the game, and are doing everything they can to be as ready and rested as possible. They’ve stayed in London from Saturday until the game on Tuesday and have the players on a special routine to prep for the intense clash at Spurs.
There is even a total ban on alcohol despite reaching the FA Cup final over the weekend, which was City’s 22nd win our of their last 23 games in all competitions.
“It’s not bad!” Guardiola said. “If we want to be in contention for the competitions, we have to make these kind of numbers. It’s really good, but we don’t have time to tell ourselves how good we are! “The only focus right now is: Don’t drink one drop of beer or alcohol. Rest, eat good, regeneration the day after tomorrow and prepare the game against one of the best teams in all terms in the Premier League and Europe when they had six days to prepare and we had two-and-a-half.
“Yeah, we won 22 of the last 23 so it’s not bad. Of course, if we want to be in contention in all competitions you have to make these kind of numbers. It’s the same with Liverpool in the Premier League.”
It isn’t normal that elite athletes/professional players in this day and age go out and have a few too many beers after each game, and City are clearly in the midst of a historic season so Guardiola and his staff will be doing all they can to keep the players focused.
City play at least twice a week throughout April as they push for the Premier League title and to advance to the UEFA Champions League final for the first time in club history.
The historic quadruple still remains a possibility, and if they do pull it off you can expect plenty of City’s players to quench their thirst with a few beers on June 1 in Madrid.
Until then, it’s kind of funny to picture Guardiola and his staff scouring the bars in central London to see if any of his players aren’t taking his words seriously.
