Guardiola: KDB goodbye could provide boost against Bournemouth | OneFootball

Pep Guardiola says the added emotion of Kevin De Bruyne’s final Etihad fixture on Tuesday evening could help City over the line against Bournemouth.

The Blues lock horns with the Cherries in a Premier League clash which will have a huge bearing on our prospects of playing Champions League football next season.

A win puts City in the driver’s seat of a five-horse race for Europe heading into the final game of 2024/25, but Bournemouth also need three points to keep their faint UEFA Conference League qualification hopes alive.

Guardiola emphasised that the full focus of the team is on picking up a result at the Etihad, but he admits De Bruyne’s added subplot and our desire to send the Belgian out on a high could benefit the players.

“Maybe it can be positive. The emotions in something special for all of them, they can do it. So yeah, it can be positive,” the boss said of De Bruyne's final Etihad fixture.

“I’m happy with the way he is playing. The relationship is still completely the same.

“There are players that are really, really difficult to replace for many reasons, we know that.

“But the season we have done is what we have done. We can’t deny it, and of course we have to move forward.”

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De Bruyne will rightly go down as one of the greatest players in City’s history when the curtain falls on his ten-year stay at the end of 2024/25.

The Belgian has won a remarkable 19 major honours since joining the Club in 2015, being named in the PFA Premier League Team of the Year and FIFA FIFPRO World XI on five occasions among a swathe of individual accolades.

And Guardiola was asked where the midfielder ranked in terms of his passing ability among players he’d worked with or faced across his career.

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He added: “It’s difficult to find. He’s one of the best three I’ve ever seen, have played or dealt with.

“One is Messi. Okay, put Kevin second. Messi is the best I’ve ever seen because he does it really close to the box. But Kevin is there.

“The stats, the goals and assists he provides to the team, the final third, the talent, in the last game he made two or three passes, one play in front of the keeper. That is unique.

“That’s why he has been one of the best players this club has had in our history. These are big words because he’s been a special player.”