The reigning champions had been enjoying an unbeaten start to the 2024/25 season until Saturday’s clash with the Cherries which saw them dominated and beaten by a side who triumphed over rival title challengers Arsenal just weeks before.
Many players and managers have spoken about potential protests to the intense football schedule which puts players in danger of exhaustion and injuries. Guardiola partly blamed this calendar for the weekend’s loss, saying his team are barely coping.
“I talked about the calendar for the season when we were winning, not just now because we lost a game. The reality is they won, we congratulate them.”
“It’s the reality we are living now,” Guardiola added. “In the previous seasons we played a lot of games, but maybe we will go to the World Cup and arrive in the last stages of that competition, we’re going to play almost 70 games.
“It’s like NBA, but they have four months holiday and we have three weeks. You have injuries for a long time like didn’t happen before. It’s normal, it’s going to happen. We have to handle it.”
“We’ll learn from this and we’ll improve. I’m fine. I still have energy. I wanted to win (on Saturday). Congratulations to Bournemouth is all I can say.”