Boss Guardiola insists he will not apologise

PEP Guardiola will not apologise for calling on more supporters to attend Manchester City’s Premier League clash against Southampton.

The City boss irritated some fans this week by saying he would like a bigger crowd for today’s match than the 38,062 that watched the win over Leipzig in the Champions League.

Kevin Parker, the general secretary of the City’s official supporters’ club, labelled the remarks “disappointing and uncalled for” as they questioned fan loyalty by drawing attention to the number of empty seats. Parker added Guardiola should be more considerate of the reasons why people are unable to attend games.

Guardiola, right, however, feels his words have been misinterpreted. He says he was speaking more generally about the benefits of playing at a full house for a tough game.

Speaking at a press conference, Guardiola said: “I’m not going to apologise for what I said. I made an approach to do something together again. What I said was we would love, and need, their support. Whether it’s 10,000 people, 40,000 or 50,000 – it doesn’t matter how many people come. We need their support.”

Yeovil boss Darren Sarll is making sure his players stick to a mantra of ‘the next game is the most important game’ in the National League.

The Glovers host Chesterfield in a fixture hastily arranged in the light of Covid outbreaks at the originally scheduled opponents of both the Glovers and Spireites.

And Sarll is taking things one game at a time: “The players need to keep focused on what is happening now, not January, February or March. Not where the play-off final is, because we don’t care, all we care about is what’s happening now.”