Pep Guardiola defends Chelsea boss Enzo Maresca as mistakes mar Erling Haaland's pre-season defeat
Pep Guardiola was quick to defend his old friend Enzo Maresca after Manchester City thrashed Chelsea in pre-season.
Manchester City won 4-0 Chelsea at Ohio Stadium in Columbus on Saturday night with Erling Haaland Scoring a hat-trick before Raheem Sterling and Noni Madueke scored two late goals to make it 4-2.
But the Blues made huge mistakes in all four goals they conceded, with Malo Gusto, Levi Colwill, Tosin Adarabioyo, Moises Caicedo and Sterling all struggling.
However, Guardiola had no criticism of his friend Maresca, who has worked at City as an assistant coach since June 2022 for 12 months.
The Catalan coach said: “I want to say one thing. This happened because of the conditions of the pitch.
“Under normal circumstances, that wouldn't happen. At Stamford Bridge, that wouldn't happen. That's for sure.
“Secondly, I saw what Enzo wants to do and I like it. I don’t give him any compliments because he is my friend and he helped me in the year of the treble.
“But I saw a lot of things today that I know he's going to do. Do you expect that after two weeks, without proper training, they're going to win the Champions League? No. I'm a big fan of his and I know he'll do well.
“It will be more difficult for us to get a result at Stamford Bridge. It is always difficult there.”
“He did great at Leicester and he'll do great here with an incredible team. It's going to be a good season for him.”
Haaland made it 2-0 to City after five minutes with a quickfire double in 60 seconds, first converting a penalty in the fourth minute before scoring immediately after kick-off.
Both goals were plagued by errors as Chelsea attempted to play out from the back and Adarabioyo passed the ball straight to Haaland before being fouled by Colwill inside the area.
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The Norwegian stood up and sent Robert Sanchez the wrong way but had to retake his penalty as City players invaded the area.
But he put it in exactly the same spot as Sanchez tried to reach it with his hand but couldn't keep it out.
From the kick-off, Haaland sought the ball, allowing Caicedo to deliver it to him almost immediately and score his second goal of the day.
City's third came when Sterling lost the ball, allowing Oscar Bobb to slot past Colwill with ease before picking out Sanchez before a mistake from Gusto allowed Haaland to score his hat-trick.
Maresca said after the match: “The pitch doesn't help. With the way we like to play, the pitch needs to be fast, but it was slowing it down.”
“We have to learn things. Probably more than the goals we conceded, we have to learn that you can't concede one and then two minutes later another.
“This is something I've just told the players: we have to learn. When they score against us, we have to become stronger so we don't score another one.”
The face of Chelsea real Madrid The next preseason game will be against the European champions at Bank of America Stadium in Charlotte, North Carolina.
