Also because Pep Guardiola intervened decisively, Manchester City salvaged a point at Liverpool FC. The coach was therefore able to nonchalantly moderate Kevin De Bruyne’s anger
You have to be brave enough to substitute Kevin De Bruyne after 68 minutes in a top match. And you first have to manage to get it right. Pep Guardiola achieved this double feat at Liverpool on Sunday.
Not despite, but because Manchester City’s coach intervened unpopularly, the defending champions salvaged a 1:1 draw with the Reds – the observers were unanimous in the aftermath. In this respect, Guardiola was able to deal calmly with the images that his decision had initially evoked: De Bruyne clapped his coach off correctly, but immediately started a loud discussion with him, which the Liverpool supporters gleefully cheered, before he sat down on the bench in a bad mood.
“I’m glad to see that. I like it when he’s angry, that’s good,” Guardiola commented on the scene after the final whistle. In the meantime, De Bruyne was already “happy” again. Perhaps he had already realized that his substitution had, for once, made Man City’s game better rather than worse
Guardiola: Without De Bruyne “we did better “
For around 20 minutes after Alexis Mac Allister’s penalty equalized (50′), it felt “like a tsunami” what the Reds did to his team, Guardiola marveled. “Oh my God!” It was mainly due to this phase that Man City ended the game with just 47 percent possession and an underground pass rate of 82.1 percent by their own standards – the last time both figures were worse was on matchday 12 of the previous season in the 3-1 defeat to Arsenal (36 and 72.3 percent).
However, after Guardiola replaced De Bruyne and Julian Alvarez with Mateo Kovacic and Jeremy Doku, the tsunami subsided at least a little. “I made the decision because I knew what we were missing. I wanted to do something to bring the game back to our side a little bit,” explained Guardiola. “With Mateo, John and Rodri, we then had the quality to play and keep the ball” – against “the best pressing team I’ve ever seen”.
In short: “After that”, i.e. without De Bruyne, “we did better. But”, Guardiola quickly added: “What can I say about Kevin … we need him and he is important.” The playmaker had underlined this not least when he prepared Man City’s lead with a brilliant corner kick and thus collected his 13th scoring point in the last twelve games. A fact that only made Guardiola’s decision in that 69th minute even more remarkable
