Manchester City won their first Champions League game of the season, 3-1 over Porto and Pep Guardiola hailed this performance as ‘perfect,’ per BT Sport.
City went a goal down early, but rallied to score three of their own. Goals from Sergio Aguero, Ilkay Gundogan and Ferran Torres were enough to get the job done. Porto put up a spirited fight, but the English side just had too much quality.
The manager talked about the challenge that the Portuguese team provided with their winning mentality. He also spoke about how he was surprised at the defensive nature of the visitors’ play.
The second half performance from his team impressed him in particular and he made it a point to mention so. City did not allow the opposition to counterattack or give them set-piece opportunities. Guardiola went on to tell BT Sport:
“We knew how tough it would be because Porto and Benfica are the best teams in Portugal. They have the winning mentality, they have to win every game.
“I was surprised they played so defensively with five at the back, we had to be patient but in the second half we didn’t concede counter-attacks, we didn’t concede set-pieces, we didn’t allow them to run.
“We did the perfect performance against a really good team. It is nice to win games while suffering.”
It was important for the Citizens to start off with a win after the disappointment of last season. Exiting the competition at the quarterfinal stage to Lyon was far below expectations.
The squad will be looking to make amends for this, and Wednesday’s game was the first step towards that process. There are a lot of injuries that City are facing at the current moment, but they are coping with that very well.
Players such as Gundogan, stepping up in the absence of Kevin De Bruyne, will be a real boost for the team and the way they fought back after going a goal down will boost the players’ confidence. Now the focus will be shifting to the Premier League where they have a tough game coming up against West Ham United.
City are currently in 11th place and will want to start climbing up the table.
The Hammers are in a good run of form, and they will present a different kind of challenge than the one Porto gave. If Guardiola’s his players can play with the same intensity that they showed on Wednesday, Manchester City can come away from London with the three points.