Guardiola denies Man City rebuild is biggest challenge of career

LONDON: Pep Guardiola has denied the task of rebuilding Manchester City is the biggest challenge of his managerial career as his team battle for a top-four finish in the Premier League.

City, who travel to face Tottenham on Wednesday, are 20 points behind leaders Liverpool after losing 2-0 to Arne Slot´s side at the weekend. They are also out of the Champions League after a 6-3 aggregate defeat to Real Madrid in the knockout phase playoffs.

But Guardiola, whose fourth-placed team have won six out of the past seven Premier League titles, said he was not fazed by the challenge of rejuvenating City, whom he joined in 2016. “We have done it already, so after nine years it´s not the same thing that we started nine years ago. We have done it two or three times already, so it´s not the biggest challenge,” the former Barcelona and Bayern Munich boss said on Tuesday.

“The challenge I had is when I was starting my managerial career and with my staff and a lot of staff, we worked together and proved myself, proved to our staff that we can do it.” City made four signings in the January transfer window -- Omar Marmoush, Abdukodir Khusanov, Nico Gonzalez and Vitor Reis -- illustrating the scale of the rebuild required following injuries and a loss of form for key players.

City have won only two of their eight games at the Tottenham Hotspur Stadium in all competitions. Their last trip there in October ended in a 2-1 defeat in the League Cup at the start of a terrible run that also included a 4-0 loss to Spurs at the Etihad Stadium. Ange Postecoglou´s side remain 12th in the Premier League despite winning their past three games but Guardiola said they are better than their results show.