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Manchester City boss Pep Guardiola <\/p>\nThere is a notable absence from Manchester City’s pre-season as they go for glory in the Club World CupManchester City boss Pep Guardiola <\/p>\n
The Club World Cup may be a shiny new(ish) tournament, but it still has unmistakable pre-season vibes for Manchester City<\/a>. The Blues have jetted off to the United States and are making sure they get some relaxation as they recover from hot and humid training sessions.<\/p>\n Players have already been enjoying time with their families between their work as City look to give them as much of a summer break as possible having called them back early<\/a> for this competition. They will take to the pitch on Wednesday for the first time, but there will still be plenty of downtime booked in.<\/p>\n One thing that won’t be seen for the first time in many a pre-season though is a breakthrough moment for an academy graduate. Pep Guardiola<\/a> has taken many over the course of his 10 years at the club and Rico Lewis, Oscar Bobb and Nico O’Reilly have all provided standout performances in recent seasons that have served as introductory markers for their first team integration.<\/p>\n This time though, there are none. Not a single player from the Under-18s or Under-21s was named in the 27-man squad that departed earlier this week, with the academy having a separate pre-season instead.<\/p>\n There are special circumstances given the Club World Cup, but it was only recently that Guardiola was expecting to take plenty of youngsters to fill out training sessions and ensure everyone got the rest they needed.<\/p>\n “We will go with the families, we will train when we have to train and prepare the games,” he said earlier this year. “It is important for the club, financially and for the prestigious. We welcome people from the academy.<\/p>\n Watch the Club World Cup free on DAZN<\/p>\n This article contains affiliate links, we will receive a commission on any sales we generate from it. Learn more<\/a> The FIFA Club World Cup will see 32 of the world’s best club teams including Man City, Chelsea, Real Madrid, PSG and Bayern Munich play across 63 games from June 14-July 13.<\/p>\n Fans can watch every match live and for free by signing up to DAZN.<\/p>\n “After we’ll see if I give extra time to arrive late and maybe the first games of the Premier League<\/a> or the first games of the season arrive a little bit later. We will see how the people arrive and how many minutes some players play, some players play less minutes. We’ll see.<\/p>\n “I think so [academy players will travel]. Even for the training sessions for some players maybe. I have to see, I have to talk with the club, with the manager for the under-23, under-18 and see.”<\/p>\n Since then, however, five winter arrivals have stuck around and been joined by four new faces as the club have been aggressive in the two transfer markets so far. A third of the squad for the Club World Cup has only been with the club for six months of less.<\/p>\n In the meantime, the manager got increasingly bothered by having to leave players out of his matchday selections. Not used to having such a big squad precisely because he dislikes having players unmotivated by not being involved in games, Guardiola fought back against the idea that the squad would have to significantly increase for next season.<\/p>\n And so while new faces have joined, two senior players have left on free transfers and two more have been left to find transfers, while the academy players will be denied the opportunity of a breakthrough summer under the eyes of the first team staff. If there is to be another homegrown talent to join the first team squad this season, they will have to shine far away from the glitz of the Club World Cup.<\/p>\n —<\/p>\n Here at the Manchester Evening News, we\u2019re dedicated to bringing you the best Manchester City coverage and analysis.<\/p>\n Make sure you don\u2019t miss out on the latest City news by joining our free WhatsApp group. You can get all the breaking news and best analysis sent straight to your phone by clicking here<\/a><\/strong> to subscribe.<\/p>\n You can also subscribe to our free newsletter service. Click here<\/a><\/strong> to be sent all the day\u2019s biggest stories.<\/p>\n And finally, if you\u2019d rather listen to our expert analysis then make sure to check out our Talking City podcast. Our shows are available on all podcast platforms, including Spotify<\/a><\/strong> and Apple Podcasts<\/a><\/strong>, and you can also watch along on YouTube<\/a><\/strong>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"There is a notable absence from Manchester City’s pre-season as they go for glory in the Club World…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":186303,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8813],"tags":[748,393,4884,2465,17192,1036,1037,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-186302","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-manchester","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-england","10":"tag-great-britain","11":"tag-manchester","12":"tag-manchester-city-eds","13":"tag-manchester-city-fc","14":"tag-pep-guardiola","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186302","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=186302"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/186302\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/186303"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=186302"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=186302"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=186302"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}![\"Content](\"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/06\/0_Untitledjpeg.jpg\")
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