Sunday Mirror (Northern Ireland)
Guardiola: Foden our new Silva
Guardiola wants to build his own Class of ‘92 at City
PEP GUARDIOLA has challenged Phil Foden to fill the boots of Manchester City legend David Silva.
Silva, the 34-year-old World Cup-winning Spaniard, will arguably sign off as City’s greatestever player when he leaves the Etihad at the end of the season.
But Guardiola will not go into the transfer market in the summer because he sees 19-year-old Foden as Silva’s natural heir.
Guardiola said: “We trust Phil – and if we didn’t believe in him, we might go to the market. We won’t because we have Phil. He is the guy who is going to take his minutes.
“Of course, Phil will still have to fight with Kevin [De Bruyne], Gundo [Ilkay Gundogan] and Bernardo [Silva] because they can play in that position.
“But Phil is an incredible player. He still has things to improve, and sometimes it takes time to understand exactly what he has to do.
“So sometimes you have to be patient.”
PEP GUARDIOLA dreams of building Manchester City’s answer to the Class of ’92.
But the coach who turned Barcelona into the world’s greatest team by harnessing homegrown talents like Lionel Messi, Xavi, Andres Iniesta, Sergio Busquets and Gerard Pique has warned that Mancunian pride can never be a substitute for pure quality.
Guardiola was delighted to see a social media film of Academy graduates Taylor Harwood-Bellis and Tommy Doyle celebrating the midweek Carabao Cup semi-final victory at Manchester United with the 3,000 away fans at Old Trafford.
Like 19-year-old midfielder Phil Foden, the two teenagers are bornand-bred Blues.
Both of Doyle’s grandfathers – Mike Doyle and Glyn Pardoe – are City legends who helped the club lift the title, FA Cup, League Cup and European Cup Winners Cup half-a-century ago.
But Guardiola insists the pressure to deliver success to the Etihad makes it tough for him to field a homegrown team capable of matching the achievements of Ryan Giggs, David Beckham, Paul Scholes and Gary Neville at Manchester United two decades ago.
Asked if City fans will get their own Class of ‘92, the City boss said: “I would like to answer by saying yes, but I really don’t know.
“When I saw the clip of them (Harwood-Bellis and Doyle) in the stand at Old Trafford supporting us, it was good. Phil came on at the end of the game as well – and they are all mates.
“But I don’t know what’s going to happen in future because it is about how they develop to be better players.
“Hopefully they will do it, because it is good when the players have a relationship like that with the club. I would like to help the young players here in the same way as Barcelona, but this is a club that is so demanding.
“Even when you win four titles here it isn’t enough. We won four titles last season and it wasn’t enough because we didn’t win the Champions League.
“That is the reality here – and also the young players have to compete against incredible central defenders and incredible midfielders.
“It is a tough reality that exceptional players like Phil Foden don’t play the minutes they should because we have other incredible players.”
Foden has opened up a pathway to the first team that youngsters like Eric Garcia, Harwood-Bellis, Doyle and Adrian Bernarbe have followed.
Garcia and Harwood-Bellis have been drafted into a central defence weakened by Vincent Kompany’s departure and the cruciate ligament injury to Aymeric Laporte.
Yaya Toure and Pablo Zabaleta have also left the club, while David Silva will depart at the end of the season, and both Sergio Aguero and Fernandinho are in the twilight of their careers.
The ideal scenario is for talent to be promoted from the youth team. But Guardiola remains wary of chasing the dream too hard.
He said: “I think it’s really difficult for young players. I’m a big fan of respecting the process with young players because we have a tendency after two games to say a player will be the new Wayne Rooney or David Beckham.
“I think a little bit of time is needed to make them believe.
“Players will leave and new ones will come in to try to maintain the level. We have to find the new players for the future – and that means building them from our academy or finding them elsewhere.”