Pep Guardiola is under huge pressure at Manchester City and the odds are falling for the Spaniard to be the next Premier League manager sacked.
City are on a dire run of form that has seen them record just one with in their last 12 matches across all competitions.
Gary O’Neil was sacked by Wolves earlier after just two wins in 16 and Southampton axed Russell Martin after one win in 17.
So is Guardiola a couple of weeks away from the sack? Express Sport writers have had their say…
Mikael McKenzie
If City miss out on the Champions League places it would be a monumental crisis. It would be a crisis for attracting players. Crisis for FFP. Crisis for sponsorship deals. Pretty much every faceat of the club will be affected.
But Guardiola has plenty of credit in the bank. They need to give him the funds to strengthen in January and he will pull them out of this rut.
Tom Parsons
City should not sack Pep Guardiola. The guy is arguably the best manager in the history of football and has been responsible for bringing unparalleled success to the Etihad Stadium.
There isn’t a better coach than the Spaniard out there and City will suffer a humiliating fall from grace if he departs the club.
Fraser Watson
When you have a manically intense dictator governing a group of players who are competing for elite trophies year in year out, at some point a drop-off is inevitable.
Yes, few would have envisaged City’s dip in form becoming as severe as it has. But like in the 2019/20 campaign, a side that has dominated in the previous years is now in need of a reset.
That reset will come this summer when, ignoring 115 other potential factors of course, Guardiola will freshen his squad and City, and their manager, will come again. Any thoughts to sack him are ludicrous.
Alex Turk
No. Sacking Pep Guardiola weeks after celebrating his new contract would only intensify the crisis narrative.
If the best active coach in football can’t get Manchester City out of this rut, would any coach entering mid-season be able to? Should the current trend continue, start a rebuild under his successor next summer.
Amos Murphy
Pep Guardiola is the greatest manager English football has ever seen.
Have City stalled in the last few months? Unquestionably. Guardiola’s blind loyalty to his generals of seasons prior has seen a sharp drop-off in quality and hunger levels this season.
But they’re the same players who helped City to a never-done-before four league titles in a row just six months ago. On top of that, there’s the 100-point season, domestic quadruple, and 2022/23 treble triumph. He’s a legend amongst men.
Pep’s departure from the Etihad will come on his own terms, nobody else’s.
Jack McEachen
It’s surely unfathomable to think about the prospect of sacking Guardiola, but at what point this not a bad run of form, but the new City? They are in serious danger of missing out on Champions League football.
If Zinedine Zidane is willing to head to Manchester they would have to at least consider picking up the phone.
