Pep Guardiola praised Manchester City’s refusal to accept defeat at Everton, but admitted the destiny of the Premier League title is out of their hands after dropping two precious points at Hill Dickinson Stadium.
City are five points behind Arsenal with a game in hand having been held to a 3-3 draw by Everton, who were a goal down by half-time, but led 3-1 in the 81st minute. Erling Haaland reduced the deficit straight from the restart after Everton’s third goal before Jérémy Doku, who opened the scoring with a superb curled finish, produced a similar effort to rescue a point with virtually the last kick of the game.
Arsenal will win the league for the first time since 2004 should they take maximum points from their final three games.
“The point is better than no points, but it would have been better to win the game,” said Guardiola. “Many things happened – the difficulty of the opponent, the incredibly aggressive way they play.
“We had composure in the first half and after they made a step up [in the second half] we maybe didn’t have the intention that we did in the first half. Our second and third goals were outstanding and we take a point.
“It was in our hands and in Arsenal’s hands, and now it is not in our hands. But we have Brentford on Saturday and we continue and we’ll see what happens.”
Guardiola denied nerves got the better of his team during a fraught second half and refused to be drawn on whether the Everton defender Michael Keane should have been sent off for a foul on Doku. He said: “We knew we had to win the game with how many games we had left, but without that emotion you cannot come back. If you give up, you cannot do what we have done tonight.”
David Moyes said Everton’s chances of qualifying for Europe were dealt a major blow by City’s 97th-minute equaliser, but was satisfied with his team’s second-half improvement. “The first half was the worst we’ve played against one of the teams up at the top,” he said.
The Everton manager, however, was scathing of the decision not to award a penalty against Bernardo Silva for dragging Merlin Röhl to the ground. The incident was checked by the video assistant referee. Moyes said: “If that doesn’t get given as a penalty then it is an absolute free-for-all. It looks you are able to grab and wrestle now. That is on the back of a terrible decision at West Ham last week.”
