Pep Guardiola explains why he's ‘satisfied’ despite Manchester City's damaging Premier League defeat against Aston Villa

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Pep Guardiola's Manchester City suffered their third Premier League defeat of the season after being edged out 1-0 by Aston Villa. It served as a damaging defeat, leaving Arsenal with a four-point lead at the top of the Premier League. City are six points adrift of The Gunners themselves, but Guardiola was not hitting the panic button. Their next Premier League match is against Bournemouth.

‘Last season was much worse’ – Guardiola upbeat despite defeat to Villa

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Pep Guardiola was surprisingly upbeat after a 1-0 Premier League defeat to Aston Villa which leaves Manchester City six points adrift of leaders Arsenal.

Matty Cash scored the only goal of the game at Villa Park to end City’s nine-match unbeaten streak, and leaves Guardiola’s men in fifth.

The visitors had double the number of shots - 18 to Villa’s nine – during the game, with Erling Haaland having a late goal ruled out for offside.

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There was also a moment of controversy when Lucas Digne went unpunished following a challenge on Matheus Nunes in the build-up to the corner from which Cash scored.

When asked by Sky Sports what he learnt from the game, Guardiola replied: "That we are a really good team who played a really good game. We started a really good game. In general, we were much better in the second half, but in the end we could not score.

"They link really well inside, they play four up front, they track you in high positions, and after they link behind, they have the ability to keep that ball, it is not easy and when you cannot win those duels it's more difficult.

"In the first half the pressing wasn't good, in the second half it was better. We were not aggressive enough."

Guardiola also reflected on Digne’s challenge on Nunes before the corner that led to the goal, but the City boss refused to lay any blame with the officials.

"It was a corner. A good corner and a goal," he explained.

"Listen, it doesn't matter. We can talk about this reaction. Listen, in 10 years already here I respect the referees too much. It was a corner, and we should've defended that. You cannot complain about actions from five minutes before.

"We had the chances to score, we couldn't do it. We will improve.

"I am satisfied. We played really well in the Premier League mainly, and we're getting better. We will learn from that. It's a long journey, we will try to be close at the end."

‘It should have been a foul’ – Bernardo rues Villa’s winner

City captain Bernardo Silva believes Digne’s challenge on Nunes warranted a free kick, but refused to lay the blame on the decision for the defeat.

The Portuguese felt it would be churlish to do so and insisted it is up to his team-mates to bounce back from that disappointment and go again.

"It's a minor decision, it's not like a penalty or a red card that changed the game. The reality is it should've been a foul," Silva added to Sky Sports.

"It wasn't, and they scored from the corner. That was a bit frustrating for us, but it's football. These small things are not that important.

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"The referee said he thought it was a corner. People make mistakes, just say sorry and go on to the next one. Don't be arrogant. Like I say, it was not because of that, that we lost the game. It was not about the referee today.

"It's still a long way to go. I don't want to draw too many conclusions. We would love to be at the top, but we're not. It's way too early to draw conclusions."

Silva reflected on the game as a whole and admitted that City’s pressing and defensive work were well below par.

He continued: "I would say we played quite well with the ball. Our offensive concepts were quite good. Even if we didn't score, we had chances."

"We made them defend deep, and they struggled in some moments. On the other side of the game, we were really bad defensively. Our pressing was really bad, we arrived two seconds late to every duel.

"That was the feeling even though our offensive concepts were quite good, but if the pressing is not good, you allow the game to be a transitional game. When our pressing is not good, we do not play well.

"Obviously they are a very good team, this is a Champions League team, a team with a lot of quality players. I do believe our defensive concepts were really bad today."

City return to action against Swansea City in the fourth round of the Carabao Cup, before hosting Bournemouth in the Premier League.

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