Manchester City are not among the favourites for the Premier League title, says Bernardo Silva | OneFootball

Bernardo Silva has insisted that Manchester City are not among the main favourites for this season’s Premier League title, speaking ahead of the weekend’s clash with Arsenal.

The midfielder’s comments arrive as Pep Guardiola’s side deal with fitness concerns to new stars such as Rayan Ait-Nouri and Rayan Cherki, and despite back-to-back wins over Manchester United and Napoli, there remains a sense that they are still short of their top level.

That belief mirrors Pep Guardiola’s recent messages in press conferences, where he has repeatedly acknowledged that rivals Arsenal and Liverpool have built squads capable of challenging Manchester City’s dominance.

The Catalan even joked this week about transfer spending narratives, suggesting that if Mikel Arteta or Arne Slot were to win the title with their respective squads this season, critics would claim it was down to money rather than coaching.

Against this backdrop, Bernardo Silva’s public downplaying of Manchester City’s title credentials could be viewed as both a reflection of realism and a method of reducing external pressure.

As Manchester City prepare for another high-stakes fixture at the Emirates Stadium this weekend, the midfielder’s words highlight the competitive edge of this season’s race.

Speaking during a new interview with ManCity.com ahead of the Premier League clash at the Emirates, Bernardo Silva has insisted that he and his City teammates are not among the ‘favourites’ for this season’s English top-flight crown.

“I would say that Liverpool and Arsenal are the favourites but, it’s the beginning and last season everyone said Manchester City were the favourites,” the Etihad Stadium captain pointed out.

“Last season the favourites were Manchester City and Arsenal. Liverpool were not a favourite and they won the Premier League. In the beginning you can’t do a lot of maths.”

He continued, “Of course, we can speak for our team and say that our level is still not where we want it to be, but we know that if we reach that level, not a lot of teams can stop us. Until February you cannot win the Premier League, but you can lose it.

“What we want is to come back to our level and get our level back to where we want it to be.”

Bernardo Silva was also asked for his reflections on last season’s difficult 5-1 defeat away to Arsenal in the Premier League, on which he said, “It was a period during the season where we didn’t have the level to compete with any team.

“They saw the opportunity to come after the guys who took away their title for two years and they came for us which is normal. It was tough for us for three months and then when we recovered it was too late, because we were already 25 points or something behind.

“If you look at the last 15 to 20 games, we did well. We were the team in the second half of the Premier League which had the most points. So the team recovered to the right level at the end of the season but, it was a period where it was tough for us, and they took advantage.”

Bernardo Silva’s candid reflections reinforce a wider theme at Manchester City this season: that the team remains a work in progress, particularly off the back of a summer that brought about plenty of change through the transfer market.

Head coach Pep Guardiola has repeatedly emphasised the importance of peaking later in the campaign, particularly after learning lessons from last year’s disrupted winter run that ruled themselves out of the running for the league title.

With Arsenal and Liverpool both flying high, Manchester City’s consistency in the coming months will likely dictate whether Bernardo Silva’s words ring true or if his cautious framing is simply a tactic to deflect pressure.

Should Manchester City rediscover their rhythm, particularly with key players regaining fitness, their track record suggests they will once again be central to the title picture come spring.