GUARDIOLA ADMITS JOE HART SNUB WAS HIS BIGGEST MAN CITY REGRET

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By ‘Sefiu Ajape

Pep Guardiola has revealed that his biggest regret at Manchester City was ignoring Joe Hart’s plea to remain the club’s goalkeeper.

Guardiola will take charge of his final match as City boss on Sunday against Aston Villa, bringing an end to his 10-year reign at the club.

The Spaniard leaves City having won 20 trophies, including six Premier League titles and the club’s first UEFA Champions League crown.

But despite his success, Guardiola admitted he has one major regret from his time at the Etihad Stadium.

He sent Joe Hart out on loan to Torino shortly after his arrival, before signing Claudio Bravo in 2016 and later bringing in Ederson.

Hart, who was England’s first-choice goalkeeper at the time, had reportedly urged Guardiola to give him a chance to adapt to the style of play required, particularly his demand for a goalkeeper capable of building attacks from the back with accurate distribution.

“I want to confess; I have regrets. When you take a lot of decisions, a lot, lot of decisions, you make mistakes,” Guardiola told Sky Sports.

“But there is one regret that I have deep inside for many years: that I didn’t give a chance to Joe Hart to be with me to prove himself how good a keeper he was.

“I should have done, not because… all respect for Claudio, all respect for Ede who came in, they were important, but in that moment, I could have said, ‘Okay, Joe, let’s try to do it together. If it doesn’t work, okay, we’ll change it’.

“But it happened. Life is sometimes… I have to take decisions, and sometimes I’m not fair enough.”

Admitting he had learnt from the experience of dealing with Hart—who has said he was furious with the decision at the time—Guardiola added, “Maybe with time then and learning. But I regret it from that time.

“In that moment, I said, ‘I believe in that. ‘ I am always stubborn in my decisions when I believe in that.

“When I have doubts, I talk with people, but when I’m completely sure, 100 percent, I say, ‘Guys, we have to do it in that way,’ and I have been at a club that has supported me absolutely in everything with that.”

The intensely driven Guardiola said dealing with human emotions is one of the hardest parts of management, particularly with players who are not in the team.

“If in that I failed, I do apologize, but it never, never was my intention or the intention of the club,” he said.