How Guardiola's fresh slogan propelled City to make it four

Manager had to contend with injuries anda dip in form but he smelled players’ hunger even after their 2022-23 treble

- Jamie Jackson

'No team has ever won four consecutive Premier League titles ... Yet." In the past fortnight Pep Guardiola referenced how the four-peat was the motivation of his post-treble Manchester City, insisting this entered their consciousness only in the spring.

But the aforementioned slogan, printed in capitals and large black font, was the de facto motto from October, when first displayed in the first-team meeting room.

So when stating last week before the pivotal trip to Tottenham that "we didn't think about" making history until recently when this ignited "something in our brain", Guardiola was using the media to remind his players they were 180 tantalising minutes from becoming, surely, the greatest team in English football history.

Pinning up the epigram was classic Guardiola, a manager who constantly dreams up fresh ways to inspire the players and himself. In late September and early October, City's tilt at the new mark listed after they endured two of their three league defeats. Guardiola, as often in a campaign bedevilled by setbacks, acted. What occurred on 23 September prompted the move: Rodri received a red card for clutching the throat of Nottingham Forest's Morgan Gibbs-White. City's vital cog was suspended for three matches and all of these were lost: the Carabao Cup trip to Newcastle (1-0) and league meetings at Wolves (2-1) and Arsenal (1-0).

A Guardiola mantra is how all title tilts are different and this one has a claim on being his hardest-fought, with the biggest bump occurring near the start. This followed a pre-season that was hardly problem-free as the captain, Ilkay Gündogan, left for Barcelona and Riyad Mahrez joined Al-Ahli for £30m.