Manchester City must bounce back quickly from the pain of their midweek Champions League exit at the hands of Real Madrid. While the defeat will sting Pep Guardiola and his players, they must pick themselves up to take on Chelsea in their FA Cup semi-final meeting at Wembley tomorrow.
Given the elite mentality that flows through the Manchester City squad, there is no doubt that they will be keen to make amends for their midweek defeat. It can be argued that they didn’t deserve to lose to Real Madrid over two legs, but in the end, the La Liga giants broke City’s hearts with their penalty shootout victory at the Etihad. But there is no time to dwell on the defeat for Pep Guardiola’s team. Another big game awaits for the FA Cup holders. It is the beauty of football that they get a chance to move on quickly from the pain of Wednesday night.
Speaking during his pre-game press conference, Pep Guardiola said that his squad had no time to feel sorry for themselves. The City manager said: “We can’t feel sorry for ourselves. In football you lose games. We performed at our best and we could not win. We will reflect in the summer about what happened during the season. You compete to win. It hasn’t happened many times in the last seasons, but sometimes you lose games. That’s what happened.”
In an interview published on mancity.com, City captain Kyle Walker echoed the sentiments of his manager. He said that his team must use the pain from Wednesday night to fuel them over the final stages of the season. Walker said: “You have to take it on the chin and move on now. It’s a hard one to take. We are a collective – we win and lose together. We’ve got another important final on Saturday against Chelsea. It hurts, and we’ve got to feel the pain. It’s a setback. Hopefully, that gives us the motivation to go on and do something special at Wembley. We go again.”
The Manchester City squad, while no doubt hurting from Wednesday night’s defeat, must put that behind them. While it was a crushing moment to have their UEFA Champions League defence ended in such a heartbreaking manner, they can still achieve a Premier League/FA Cup double this season. That would be another incredible achievement to add to their resume, so they must quickly rebound from the setback suffered against Real Madrid.
It will take a monumental effort from Pep Guardiola and his players to back up from 120 dramatic minutes of play only a few nights ago. But given their past achievements, they are fully capable of responding tomorrow against Chelsea.
