{"id":290,"date":"2026-03-18T05:40:50","date_gmt":"2026-03-18T05:40:50","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/osport.com.ng\/?p=290"},"modified":"2026-03-18T05:40:50","modified_gmt":"2026-03-18T05:40:50","slug":"pep-guardiola-makes-arsenal-and-liverpool-claim-after-man-citys-champions-league-exit-football","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/osport.com.ng\/?p=290","title":{"rendered":"Pep Guardiola makes Arsenal and Liverpool claim after Man City&#8217;s Champions League exit | Football"},"content":{"rendered":"<p> <br \/>\n<\/p>\n<div>\n<figure class=\"img-container shareable-item wp-caption\">\n<div class=\"img-wrap\">\n\t\t<img fetchpriority=\"high\" width=\"646\" height=\"358\" src=\"https:\/\/metro.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Pep-Guardiola-b016.jpg?quality=90&amp;strip=all&amp;w=646\" class=\"article-image wp-image-27500466\" alt=\"\" decoding=\"sync\"\/>\t<\/div><figcaption>Pep Guardiola insists Arsenal remain the best team in the Champions League (Prime Video)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>Pep Guardiola believes Arsenal remain the best team in the Champions League and claims Jurgen Klopp\u2019s Liverpool has been the \u2018biggest challenge\u2019 of his career.<\/p>\n<p>Manchester City crashed out of the Champions League on Tuesday night as they were beaten 2-1 at home by Real Madrid, who also secured a 3-0 win at the Santiago Bernabeu last week.<\/p>\n<p>Guardiola\u2019s side now have the chance to win their first trophy of the season this weekend as they play Arsenal in the Carabao Cup final at Wembley.<\/p>\n<p>And following his side\u2019s Champions League exit, Guardiola believes Arsenal head into Sunday\u2019s Carabao Cup final as the favourites.<\/p>\n<p>\u2018We will challenge against the best team in England, so far, the best team in Europe, look at the results in the group stage, they have been the first, they\u2019ve maybe lost three or four games this season,\u2019 Guardiola said after City\u2019s defeat to Real Madrid.<\/p>\n<p>\u2018It\u2019s the best, challenge them how we are, compete with them, we\u2019ll have to see, after one or two weeks we play them in the Premier League and see. Football is that.<\/p>\n<figure class=\"img-container shareable-item wp-caption\">\n<div class=\"img-wrap\">\n\t\t<img width=\"646\" height=\"462\" src=\"https:\/\/metro.co.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/SEI_289883326-b029.jpg?quality=90&amp;strip=all&amp;w=646\" class=\"article-image wp-image-27501061\" alt=\"Soccer Football - UEFA Champions League - Round 16 - Second Leg - Manchester City v Real Madrid - Etihad Stadium, Manchester, Britain - March 17, 2026 Real Madrid's Vinicius Junior shakes hands with Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola after the match Action Images via Reuters\/Lee Smith\" decoding=\"async\" loading=\"lazy\"\/>\t<\/div><figcaption>Manchester City have been knocked out of the Champions League by Real Madrid (Action Images via Reuters)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<div class=\"factbox\" data-ico=\"factbox_article\" data-track-module=\"factbox_article\">\n<h2 class=\"factbox-title\">\n<p>\t\t\t\tYour football fix\t\t\t<\/h2>\n<div class=\"factbox-content\">\n<p><strong>Metro<\/strong>&#8216;s Head of Sport James Goldman delivers punchy analysis, transfer talk and his take on the week&#8217;s biggest stories direct to your inbox every week.<\/p>\n<p>Sign up here, it&#8217;s an open goal.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p>\u2018Sometimes they are better so it\u2019s a good mirror to see what we have to do beat them. It\u2019s just a game, we\u2019ll prepare, try to compete and see who we are.<\/p>\n<p>\u2018In the end the results have not been good, except against Newcastle (in the FA Cup), but I\u2019ve had the feeling we are an extraordinary team, we have many, many good things that I love to watch but we are still not complete, we are not aware in certain moments and departments that we have to be more clinical and still we are not.<\/p>\n<div class=\"factbox\" data-ico=\"factbox_article\" data-track-module=\"factbox_article\">\n<h2 class=\"factbox-title\">\n<p>\t\t\t\tChampions League quarter-final draw\t\t\t<\/h2>\n<div class=\"factbox-content\">\n<p>Paris Saint-Germain vs Galatasaray or Liverpool<\/p>\n<p>Real Madrid vs Atalanta or Bayern Munich<\/p>\n<p>Newcastle United or Barcelona vs Atletico Madrid or Tottenham<\/p>\n<p>Sporting CP vs Arsenal<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p>\u2018My feeling is that it is a question of time, that happened when I arrived here in my first season, it needs a bit of time.\u2019<\/p>\n<p>Guardiola also dismissed the suggestion that beating Madrid in the Champions League has been the biggest challenge of his career.<\/p>\n<p>\u2018No, Jurgen Klopp at Liverpool was my biggest challenge,\u2019 Guardiola said.<\/p>\n<p>\u2018You almost don\u2019t realise what it was like to face Liverpool. Those games were a great learning experience for the team, because to play a team like us who had not been in the competition 12 or 13 years ago, and the generation we had, they had won those games sometimes, Real Madrid have beaten us, we\u2019ve won some, we\u2019ve had great times as well, but I think the teams we\u2019ve played against also know they\u2019ve played us too.\u2019<\/p>\n<p class=\"\"><strong>For more stories like this,\u00a0check our sport page<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"\"><strong>Follow Metro Sport for the latest news on <meta charset=\"utf-8\"\/><br \/>\n<strong>Facebook, <\/strong><a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/Metro_Sport\">Twitter<\/a> and\u00a0Instagram<\/strong>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"metro-more-link\"><svg><title>Arrow<\/title>\n<use xlink:href=\"#common-right-arrow\" href=\"#common-right-arrow\"\/><\/svg><span class=\"mor-link\" data-track-module=\"mor-link_article\">MORE: Arsenal star Declan Rice sends message to Man City ahead of Carabao Cup final<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"metro-more-link\"><svg><title>Arrow<\/title>\n<use xlink:href=\"#common-right-arrow\" href=\"#common-right-arrow\"\/><\/svg><span class=\"mor-link\" data-track-module=\"mor-link_article\">MORE: Enzo Fernandez raises doubt over Chelsea future and aims dig at Liam Rosenior after PSG defeat<\/span><\/p>\n<p class=\"metro-more-link\"><svg><title>Arrow<\/title>\n<use xlink:href=\"#common-right-arrow\" href=\"#common-right-arrow\"\/><\/svg><span class=\"mor-link\" data-track-module=\"mor-link_article\">MORE: Eberechi Eze injury latest after Arsenal beat Bayer Leverkusen in Champions League<\/span><\/p>\n<section id=\"share-buttons-bottom\" class=\"share-buttons share-buttons-bottom\">\n\t\t\t<span><svg><title>Comment now<\/title>\n<use xlink:href=\"#social-comment\" href=\"#social-comment\"\/><\/svg><\/span><br \/>\n\t\t\t<span class=\"share-bar-comments__label\">Comments<\/span><\/p>\n<p>\t\t\t\t<span><svg><title>Add Metro as a Preferred Source on Google<\/title>\n<use xlink:href=\"#social-preferred-source\" href=\"#social-preferred-source\"\/><\/svg><\/span><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t<span class=\"share-bar-preferred-source__label\">Add as preferred source<\/span><br \/>\n\t\t\t<\/section>\n<div class=\"newsletter-end-card accent--sport\">\n<div class=\"newsletter-end-card__inner\">\n<h4>Football Newsletter \u2013 In The Mixer<\/h4>\n<p>Punchy analysis, transfer talk and more from Metro&#8217;s football experts, sent straight to your inbox every week.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<\/p><\/div>\n<p><script async src=\"\/\/platform.twitter.com\/widgets.js\" charset=\"utf-8\"><\/script><script async src=\"\/\/www.instagram.com\/embed.js\"><\/script><br \/>\n<br \/><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Pep Guardiola insists Arsenal remain the best team in the Champions League (Prime Video) Pep<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":291,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-290","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-arsenal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/osport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/290","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/osport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/osport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/osport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/osport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=290"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/osport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/290\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/osport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/291"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/osport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=290"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/osport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=290"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/osport.com.ng\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=290"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}