City of Joy
> Man City title win would be ‘one of the best’ says Guardiola <
PEP GUARDIOLA says winning the Premier League will be one of the greatest achievements of his glittering career after Manchester City moved to the brink of the title with a stylish 3-1 win over Tottenham yesterday.
Guardiola’s side extended their lead over second-placed Manchester United to 16 points thanks to goals from Gabriel Jesus, Ilkay Gundogan and Raheem Sterling at Wembley.
Guardiola has won titles with Barcelona and Bayern Munich, while also conquering the Champions League during his Camp Nou reign.
But the Spaniard believes leading City to the title would rank among his finest moments.
“It’s more difficult (to win in England). Physicality, weather conditions, the amount of games. The Premier League is so, so tough,” Guardiola said.
“That’s why winning next week, hopefully we will, it will remain in our hearts forever.
“It’s one of the best by far. Winning titles in every league is important, with Barcelona was special.
“But the Premier League is one of the nicest and most important.”
After sweeping through most of the season in regal fashion, City had crashed down to earth with a bump over the last 10 days.
Their limp Champions League quarterfinal exit against Liverpool came either side of their failure to clinch the title last weekend, when United came from two goals down to beat them.
But it quickly became clear that run of three successive defeats wasn’t weighing on City.
Taking a shot at critics who slammed City’s recent blip, Guardiola said: “People said it was a big failure last week. They don’t understand anything.
“The Champions League is seven knockout games. The league is nine months. It’s much more important what these players have done.
“The players have my total respect. It’s incredible. They have been unbelievable.”
Asked if it would be extra special to win a league where some said his purist principles wouldn’t work, Guardiola said: “Yes. We did it...we almost did it!” – AFP Daniel Ricciardo (AUS/Red Bull) 305km in 1hr35min35.980sec Valtteri Bottas (FIN/Mercedes) +8.894 Kimi Raikkonen +9.637 Lewis Hamilton + 16.985 Max Verstappen + 20.436 Nico Hülkenberg + 21.052 Fernando Alonso + 30.639 Sebastian Vettel + 35.286 Carlos Sainz Jr + 35.763 Kevin Magnussen + 39.594 Estéban Ocon + 44.050 Sergio Perez + 44.725 Stoffel Vandoorne (BEL/McLaren) + 49.373 Lance Stroll + 55.490 Sergey Sirotkin + 58.241 Marcus Ericsson + 1:02.604 Romain Grosjean + 1:05.296 Pierre Gasly + 1:06.330 Charles Leclerc + 1:22.575 Brendon Hartley (NZL/Toro Rosso) + 5 laps (FIN/Ferrari) (GBR/Mercedes) (NED/Red Bull) (GER/Renault) (ESP/McLaren) (GER/Ferrari) (ESP/Renault) (DEN/Haas) (FRA/Force India) (MEX/Force India) (CAN/Williams) (RUS/Williams) (SWE/Sauber) (FRA/Haas) (FRA/Toro Rosso) (MON/Sauber)