"We stopped training after 10 minutes or so" - Kevin De Bruyne reveals Manchester City hardly prepared for 2-0 win against Manchester United
Manchester City's Kevin De Bruyne has revealed they spent just 10 minutes in tactical training before their derby win over Manchester United. Pep Guardiola reportedly did not want to work on tactics until he knew what formation the Red Devils would play.
Manchester City registered a comfortable 2-0 win at Old Trafford last weekend. Manchester United's Eric Bailly scored an own goal before Bernardo Silva doubled City's lead just before half-time.
Speaking to Mid Mid, de Bruyne revealed that Guardiola was unsure about the formation Ole Gunnar Solskjaer would employ and thus wanted to play the waiting game.
"The day before a game we usually train tactically, based on how the opponent plays. Before [Manchester] United, Pep said: 'We don't know how they are going to play. We shall see'. And we stopped training after 10 minutes or so."
"Often Pep knows how the opponent is going to play. This time he didn't know, so he didn't know what to do. We have done what we always do, but he didn't know beforehand if they would play with five at the back, with four, a diamond in the middle, or with three up front."
Pep Guardiola's Manchester City have skipped tactical training in the past
Kevin de Bruyne's claim of skipping tactical training ahead of the Manchester United game is not new. Last year, the Belgian made said Manchester City spent just 15 minutes discussing tactics ahead of their 3-1 win over the Red Devils in the Carabao Cup semi-finals.
"We did 15 minutes this morning," he said. "That's about it. But it's not like we never did it before so we did already a sometimes against teams who prefer to play man against man – Cardiff, United, I think Barcelona the way we did it the first year. So we've done it a couple of times."
Manchester City are second in the Premier League table, three points behind leaders Chelsea. Guardiola's side have some tricky fixtures coming up as they're scheduled to face the likes of Everton, PSG, and West Ham United this month.