TEN MINUTES

...that’s how long Pep spent preparing City for derby

/See Pages 52, 53, 54 & 55

KEVIN de Bruyne has revealed City scrapped training after just 10 minutes the day before the derby as Pep Guardiola didn’t know how United were going to play.

Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s team had won 3-0 at Tottenham with a back three a week earlier but midway through their draw with Atalanta they reverted to a back four after Raphael Varane picked up an injury.

With Varane ruled out for the derby, it wasn’t clear how the Reds would line-up. So

Guardiola called an early end to training last Friday as he didn’t know what information to give his players.

“The day before a game we usually train tactically, based on how the opponent play,” De Bruyne said.

“Before United, Pep said: ‘We don’t know how they are going to play. We shall see’. And we stopped training after 10 minutes or so.

“Often Pep knows how the opponent is going to play. This time he didn’t know, so he didn’t know what to do.

“We have done what we always do, but he didn’t know beforehand if they would play with five at the back. With four. A diamond in the middle. With three upfront.”

Despite the lack of training and the uncertainty as to how United would play, City had few problems in dealing with their threat. Solskjaer set up with a back three but was forced to chance system at half-time with the Blues already 2-0 up and in cruise control.

This isn’t the first time De Bruyne has revealed little work on the training ground was required to secure victory at Old Trafford.

The Belgian shone in a 3-1 Carabao Cup semi-final first-leg win in January 2020, when the Blues’ fluid front line that saw De Bruyne and Bernardo interchange as false nines tore United to shreds.

Asked after the game how much tactical work had gone into the game plan, he said: “We did 15 minutes this morning. That’s about it.

“But it’s not like we never did it before so we did already a sometimes against teams who prefer to play man against man - Cardiff, United, I think Barcelona the way we did it the first year.

“So we’ve done it a couple of times.”

Bernardo Silva - Fan favourite and world-class footballer