Former Manchester City defender Joleon Lescott has said that he wouldn’t be surprised if Pep Guardiola left the club at the end of the season if they win their fourth Premier League title in a row.
City are in the driving seat to lift the trophy again this season and know that wins in their last two games would see them do so. Arsenal do however continue to put the pressure on and could be there if City do slip up.
Four titles in a row would be the most that any team has achieved in the Premier League on the spin. It would also come after a historic treble won by the team last season and, when asked if Guardiola could leave if the title is won again, Lescott outlined why that could be possible.
“Potentially it could happen because you don’t know how draining this is,” he said on TNT Sport. “He makes teams go out there, but the consistency and the work ethic, he as an individual has to put in, the motivation he has to give to his players every day, not just for training but for every game.
“It must be tiring so if at the end of it and he has done four in a row, he may recognise it and think ‘this is me’. That wouldn’t surprise me. I would have been more confident saying that if it was another double treble.”
The race for the title comes with Premier League charges still hanging over the club. City face a total of 115 charges of breaching the league’s financial rules. Other clubs, such as Everton and Nottingham Forest have already had their hearings and punishments handed out in that time.
But the complex nature of City’s case means that it has taken a lot longer. The latest reports claim that the hearing is due to take place in October this year.
MEN Sport understands that club could know the outcome of the charges by the summer of 2025, meaning that there is still a long way to go until the situation may be solved. The unprecedented nature of the case means that any potential punishment is unknown, but there is a possibility of the club being automatically expelled from the league, or being handed a huge points deduction, two things that could also cast doubts over the future of Guardiola.
For the manager, all of the concentration is solely on the next game coming up. When asked about the significance of lifting a fourth title in a row he said: “Ask me that at the end of the last game of the season.
“Now it will be about relaxing and recovering well because we have three days until the next one. One step at a time. We have this challenge in our hands.”
