Pep Guardiola admits Man City play Phil Foden ‘against his potential’ | OneFootball

Pep Guardiola has said he could carry on playing Phil Foden “against his potential” as a winger, even though Thomas Tuchel has said he only sees the Manchester City man in central positions in his England team.

Tuchel is just considering the 25-year-old for the roles as a No 10 or a false nine in his team but while Guardiola agrees that the Mancunian is at his best in the middle, the City manager feels Foden can deliver goals from a starting position off the flank and said he will volunteer to play as a winger.

Foden struck twice in City’s 3-2 win over Leeds on Saturday and is City’s second top scorer this season with six goals in all competitions – more than wingers Jeremy Doku, Savinho and Oscar Bobb have got between them.

And Guardiola said: “I agree with Thomas. I like Phil behind the striker, close to the box. The guys who have this sense of goal have to be close to the goal. But sometimes it can be wide and be another player more inside, but I like Phil in central positions.

“But he can play as a winger. For me as a winger, Savio and Jeremy and even Oscar have attributes, because the other three don't have the sense of goal that we lack a little bit. I like the players like who arrive and have the feeling that they can score. The big teams score [with] many, many players. If just Erling [Haaland] is the guy who score the goals, we will struggle.”

Guardiola thinks Foden is back to the kind of form he showed in 2023-24, when he scored 27 goals and was named Footballer of the Year and said it is a joy to manage him.

He added: “This season has been the Phil we met for a long, long time ago. The impact when that guy arrived at 16 or 17 years at the training session and started to play was, ‘Oh my God, what a player’. And every year he was better and better and better.

“Two years ago, when we won the Premier League here, when we won [against] West Ham in the last game, he was the best player of the league. Last season was the same as the team, you have the same season.

“But the growth of Phil every season is top for many, many, many reasons. It's a joy, it's a pleasure, it's a gift to have him.

“And as much as he's happy, he's alive and he has an incredible thing, you say ‘Phil, you have to play there’, in a position like maybe it's against his potential, like we say, playing the right, playing the left more wider. [He will say] ‘I want to play right or left. I want to help the team. I want to run.’”