Guardiola's creativity has saved Man City's season

Pep Guardiola has devised many a winning strategy, some much admired, some much imitated. Yet this was not the plan, or even close to being the plan.

- RICHARD JOLLY

“If you tell me at the beginning of the season that at the end of the season you are fighting for the FA Cup final or to qualify for the Champions League with Nico [O’Reilly] and Matheus [Nunes] at full-back I’d say, ‘What are you talking about?’” he said.

The plan was Josko Gvardiol and Kyle Walker, one among the most expensive defenders in history, the other one of the defining right-backs of his generation. Not an attacking midfielder from the youth system who had not made a senior appearance before this season and a £50m misfit of a midfielder. At the start of the campaign, neither ranked in Guardiola’s top four options for the positions they now occupy.

But then the plan in attack was to build around a No 9 with the potential to break goalscoring records. Instead, Guardiola, the manager who did more than anyone else to revive the tactic of the false nine, arguably isn’t even using one of those as much as two No 10s and two wingers.

Erling Haaland is injured, Walker is on loan at AC Milan and Gvardiol is playing at centre-back. If many a Guardiola team evolves over a season, this one feels more like revolution. This, however, is a reflection of this being no normal year.