Pep Guardiola explains argument with Anthony Taylor during Man City draw with West Brom

Guardiola was unhappy with amount of added-on time

Mark Critchley
Northern Football Correspondent
Wednesday 16 December 2020 02:29 EST
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Pep Guardiola remonstrates with fourth official Anthony Taylor
Pep Guardiola remonstrates with fourth official Anthony Taylor (Getty Images)

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Pep Guardiola was unhappy with the decision to only allow four minutes of stoppage time at the end of Manchester City’s 1-1 draw with West Bromwich Albion on Tuesday night.

Television cameras captured Guardiola remonstrating with fourth official Anthony Taylor as he prepared to indicate the amount of additional minutes, even grabbing Taylor's electronic board.

City went close to winning the game in the final four minutes regardless, only for West Bromwich goalkeeper Sam Johnstone to brilliantly deny both Ilkay Gundogan and Raheem Sterling at point-blank range.

The result meant that City have drawn as many games as they have won this season and raised yet more questions about their wasteful attack, with just 18 goals in 12 games.

When asked why he was so animated with Taylor on the touchline, Guardiola said: "It wasn't a problem. I said four minutes from my point of view was not enough.

"I think Gabriel [Jesus] was down for three minutes, there were six substitutions and the 'keeper had 30 seconds every time to make a long kick so I made the comment but he decided and that's okay.  

"I expected more but at the end we had enough chances to win and we could not score."

Guardiola was left to count the cost of missed chances once again, as a combination of Johnstone's heroics and City's own profligacy led to yet more dropped points.

City have already dropped 16 points after 12 games this season - more than they did in the entirety of their 2017-18 Premier League title-winning campaign.

"I wanted to win and we couldn’t do it," Guardiola said. "We had chances but unfortunately we were not able to score goals, especially in the last three or four actions we had."

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