As Manchester City enter the home stretch of the season, the general feeling is that Bernardo Silva will play his final matches with the club before leaving when his contract expires in June. Guardiola’s deputy Pep Lijnders let it slip last week that Bernardo was preparing to leave, although the coach said on Friday the player had not yet informed him of the decision.
“I am very angry with Bernardo,” he said at a press conference. A month ago I told him, “If you make a decision, you have to be the first to tell me,” and he hasn’t said anything to me yet. It is up to him to announce this decision. I told him, jokingly, that he owed me for this honesty, but he didn’t tell me anything, so I don’t know what’s going on. »
Guardiola, however, praised the incredible commitment of the player who has spent the longest time under his command since the start of his coaching career, and said he was reassured in his decision to entrust him with the captain’s armband at the start of the season.
“Yes, it was the best decision I made this season. The previous ones were good too. Everyone is important, but the captain is simple. If you think the team comes first, sometimes politicians say that kind of thing – the country comes first, but then it never comes first – but with Bernardo it’s like that. With most of the captains I’ve had, you always have to think about what the team needs, but that’s not always possible. In general, it’s in the good times that the team comes first, but it’s in the bad times that you need to be there, when everything is going against you personally, and you put the team, the club and the organization first, and not everyone was capable of doing that. »
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