Guardiola urges Man City to ‘be better’; backs Arteta to do ‘excellent job’

Pep Guardiola has called for Manchester City to “be better” even after their 5-0 victory against Arsenal at the Etihad on Saturday.

Before this game, Man City recovered from their opening weekend loss to Tottenham as they beat Norwich City 5-0.

They clearly took confidence from that win as they eased past Mikel Arteta’s Arsenal.

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City took the lead in the seventh minute through Ilkay Gundogan and five minutes later Ferran Torres doubled their lead.

The hosts were already in control but Arsenal’s situation was made worst in the 35th minute. Granit Xhaka was shown a straight red card for a dangerous tackle on Joao Cancelo.

Gabriel Jesus and Rodri got on the scoresheet either side of half time before Torres scored his second goal in the final ten minutes.

It finished 5-0 and this result gives the champions six points from their first three Premier League games.

Guardiola was asked about the victory in an interview with BBC Sport. He insisted that Man City “have to be better” moving forward:

“We scored a goal that we didn’t deserve. We didn’t play that good to score a goal,” Guardiola said.

“The first time we arrived in the Arsenal half we scored. We had problems in the first 15-20 minutes in our build up. After 2-0 and sending off the game is completely different.”

On the second half: “Respect the opponent, be serious in our process and our job. We created chances, we scored two more, the most important thing is that we played with respect to the opponent and not do silly things with the ball. We are still in the process of improving. Like I said to the players after the game. It was nice winning today but we have to be better.”

On Arteta: “Arteta knows how I love him. In the two or three years he was here he was important to what we built. People want results right away, with the players he had today, Ben White, Thomas Partey were missing, many players they invested in were missing, without that it is difficult.

“I know his awareness as a manager and as a leader, the moment everyone is back he will do an excellent job. I know this because I know him, I know the job he can do.”