Man City players ‘questioning each other’ as champions suffer ninth defeat – EXCLUSIVE

Manchester City players are questioning each other amid a dreadful downturn in fortunes, according to Premier League icon Stephen Warnock. Pep Guardiola’s side suffered their ninth defeat of the campaign on Saturday as they lost 2-1 to Aston Villa.

The Citizens were second best at Villa Park as Jhon Duran and Morgan Rogers struck for the hosts before Phil Foden bagged a late consolation.

The north west giants ended the day sixth in the Premier League table and nine points behind leaders Liverpool as their faint title hopes all but disappeared.

City have been on a downward spiral since losing Rodri to an ACL injury at the end of September and have lost six of their last eight top flight encounters. The eight-time Premier League champions have also lost two of their last three Champions League matches and were dumped out of the Carabao Cup by Tottenham at the end of October.

And Warnock, who made 212 Premier League appearances during spells with Liverpool, Blackburn and Aston Villa, has given his verdict on the situation at the Etihad Stadium.

The former left-back, in association with BetBrain, exclusively revealed to Express Sport: “Obviously there has been a lot of talk about the Rodri situation and I do think that’s had a big knock-on effect.

“But I think what we’re seeing is a team that has never suffered in confidence and now they’re suffering in confidence. And they’ve never had to deal with this.

“It’s such a difficult thing to try and turn back on and the players are starting to sort of question each other at the moment and finding life difficult on the pitch.

“Pep Guardiola has so often come up with an answer and at the moment he hasn’t found that answer to the system. They have had a lot of injuries as well. I don’t think we can hide behind that.

“He does work with a small squad, albeit a very talented squad. But they’re finding it difficult to find those answers.

“What we’re seeing at Manchester City and what Pep Guardiola’s spoken about is the need for a little bit of a change of the guard if you like and he needs to freshen things up within the squad. And we’ll start to see that probably straight away in January.”

City will be aiming to turn their form around over the festive period and will be targeting maximum points when they host Everton on Boxing Day. The side then travel to Leicester next Sunday before beginning 2025 with a home clash against West Ham.