 "Premier League: Five reasons why defending champions Manchester City have struggled this season")
Manchester City have been the team to beat in the Premier League for close to a decade now ever since legendary manager Pep Guardiola took over from Manuel Pellegrini in the summer of 2016. with the club having won six league titles along with two FA Cups, four League Cups and three Community Shields. Their absolute dominance can be gauged from the fact that they finished on top of the Premier League table in six of the last seven years, winning the last four in a row and finishing with a record 100 points in 2017-18.
City had also fulfilled their dream of being crowned European champions last year after defeating Inter Milan 1-0 in Istanbul to win the UEFA Champions League in 2022-23, the season in which they completed the hallowed ’treble’ – adding the FA Cup to the league and the European titles.
City certainly have benefited immensely from the Abu Dhabi United Group’s takeover in 2008 that allowed them to sign some of the world’s best players for record prices over the years, transforming from a team that used to fight for top-flight survival at the turn of the millennium into world beaters.
Things, however, aren’t going as swimmingly as City would have hoped with the defending English champions currently at the fourth spot on the table, trailing leaders Liverpool by 8 points.
City currently are on a six-game winless streak across competitions, including a 0-4 and 1-4 defeats against Tottenham Hotspur (Premier League) and Sporting CP (Champions League) respectively, and are far from favourites for the blockbuster away league game against Liverpool on Sunday.
Here are some of the reasons why City are far from the dominant outfit they’ve been in recent seasons:
Defensive woes
After losing five matches in a row across competitions, Man City were held to a 3-3 draw by Dutch club Feyenoord despite leading 3-0 eight minutes into the second half thanks to an Erling Haaland brace.
A strong defence was the foundation on which Guardiola had built the imposing tower that is Manchester City, and a sharp decline in that department has been one of the reasons behind their downfall this season. City have leaked 17 goals in the last six matches and have not kept a clean sheet since their 1-0 victory over a struggling Southampton on 26 October.
Rodri’s absence
Spanish defensive midfielder Rodri, who beat Real Madrid's Vinicius Jr to the Ballon d'Or this year, has been a vital part of City’s red-hot run ever since he joined the club from Atletico Madrid in 2019. The 28-year-old however, suffered an Anterior Cruciate Ligament (ACL) injury that led to him getting ruled out of the remainder of the season in late September, inflicting a massive blow to City’s hopes of winning a fifth title on the trot.
It’s not just Rodri that City are missing this season though, with Belgian midfielder Kevin de Bruyne recently making a comeback from an injury in the Champions League defeat against Sporting after nearly two months.
Overdependence on Haaland
City’s attack has also become a bit one-dimensional, one that is excessively dependent on Norwegian goal-scoring machine Erling Haaland – which has been the case ever since Argentine forward Julian Alvarez parted ways with Guardiola and his team and left for Atletico.
While Haaland remains the leading goal-scorer in the Premier League and has 17 goals to his credit across competitions in the 2024-25 season, opposition teams have been able to figure a way out to neutralise him without having to worry too much about others stepping up in his absence.
Off-field drama
City also find themselves mired in an off-field crisis that has cast a shadow over their season, which likely will have had a negative impact on their on-field performances. The 10-time English top-flight winners are going through a series of hearings before an independent commission after being accused of committing more than 100 breaches of the Premier League’s financial regulations between 2009 and 2018.
Though City continue to vehemently deny any wrongdoing in the matter, insisting they have a “comprehensive body of irrefutable evidence” to clear their name, they face the prospect of being expelled from the Premier League if found guilty.
Guardiola’s uncertain future
It’s not just the allegations pertaining to the alleged financial irregularities that has kept City distracted this season. There were reports of Guardiola parting ways with the club sooner rather than later with City’s Director of Football Txiki Begiristain set to leave the club after 12 years as sporting director. Begiristain not only played alongside Guardiola for Spain as well as for Barcelona and was instrumental in bringing the Calatan to City, he is also a close friend and a confidant.
Guardiola ended up signing a two-year extension to his contract that was supposed to expire at the end of the current season, meaning he’s here to stay till 2027 and will complete a decade at City after all. The contract extension though, did not deter Guardiola from issuing a veiled threat to the Man City owners on Saturday, on the eve of the away meeting against Liverpool, when he stated that he would not hesitate to pack up his belongings and leave Manchester if he did not feel the love.
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