On Thursday night, Man City were one of 32 teams to find out their fate for the group stage of the 2023/24 Champions League, and the draw couldn’t really have been any kinder to Pep Guardiola’s team.
The holders will be looking to retain the trophy, and with the final at Wembley again, it affords Guardiola the chance of winning the ‘cup with the big ears’ for the second time at the stadium and his fourth time in total as a manager.
He has fond memories of the famous old ground given that he was part of the team that won Barcelona’s first-ever European Cup back in 1992 too.
The #UCL draw in full ? pic.twitter.com/5aUSPOGY2e
— FUN88 (@fun88eng) August 31, 2023
Standing in City’s way are RB Leipzig – for whom Josko Gvardiol will have an immediate reunion – Crvena Zvezda (Red Star Belgrade) and Young Boys.
Though there’s always a chance of an upset or two each season, Red Star and Young Boys will surely find it hard to overcome Europe’s best team at this early stage of the season, given the way that City are already player.
Leipzig could prove to be a more difficult customer, and one only has to look at the way they dismantled Bayern Munich in the German Super Cup to see that they have a squad to cause problems.
In Dani Olmo too, they have a sensational striker that will work Gvardiol and his colleagues for the full 90 minutes.