Pep Guardiola shares how he plans to take Manchester City into new Champions League format
By Hidayah Ali
Manchester City return to Champions League football this week, with their first fixture coming up against Inter Milan.
The Champions League 24/25 season has arrived and it arrives with a brand-new format to its' name as the group stage has been replaced by a League phase.
There now is no group stage with eight groups made out of four, now there are 36 teams all in a big league table together and all have eight teams drawn to them who they will encounter throughout the phase. The top eight will secure qualification to the last 16, while 9 to 24 will have to go through a qualification stage and any number before that will be eliminated from the competition.
For Manchester City, they go into this new edition as favourites to claim the title, widely ahead of Real Madrid and Inter Milan who are on second and third.
The 2023 champions have two extra fixtures than previous seasons to attend, with a total of eight opponents awaiting the Cityzens.
Matchday one will see Man City and Inter Milan battle it out for three points, in a repeat of the 2023 final which saw the Sky Blues finally achieve their Champions League-winning dreams.
With the first game fast approaching, manager Pep Guardiola shared how he plans to take Man City into this newly formatted Champions League.
Pep Guardiola
"We (look to) win our first game and then the second one and see what happens. In the last games, (we will) take a look. Like in the premier league, we will look at the table in the future. Win the first games and then we will see."
"If we are lucky to play in the future, we will know what we need to know. We have to try to win otherwise anything can happen."
"(On playing extra games) I don't think much about what happens in January or February. Man things can happen. I'm focused on trying to win tomorrow (Inter Milan) and for the first of the days (Sunday) Arsenal."
"In modern football, you have to handle the present and that's all."
"It's the first game of the eight-game group stage, we know what we have to do."
While Man City start their journey against familiar side Inter, other Premier League clubs also have big tasks ahead as Arsenal start off against European League winners Atalanta, Aston Villa play Young boys and Liverpool meet AC Milan.
Man City Square prediction:
Manchester City 3-1 Inter Milan