Pep Guardiola has reaffirmed his support for Manchester City following the club's guilty verdict in the Premier League's long-running financial case, bringing renewed attention to comments in which he previously said he would walk away if the club's hierarchy ever lied to him.
Guardiola, who left his position as City manager at the end of last season after a decade in charge, has remained closely connected to the club and now works as a global ambassador for City Football Group.
Following the verdict, he made clear that his support for the club and its leadership had not changed. City were found guilty of 114 of the 115 charges brought against them, although the club continues to deny wrongdoing and plans to appeal the findings. No final sporting punishment has yet been imposed.
The latest development has inevitably revived one of Guardiola's strongest statements from the early stages of the controversy.
In May 2022, when questions were being raised about City's finances following an earlier UEFA case, Guardiola said his defence of the club was based on what senior officials had told him.
He explained that whenever allegations were made against City, he would ask the club's hierarchy for an explanation and accept their response. Guardiola added that his position would change immediately if he discovered that he had been deliberately misled.
That stance was particularly relevant because UEFA had previously imposed a two-year ban on City from European competition. The Court of Arbitration for Sport subsequently overturned the ban, while reducing the accompanying fine.
Guardiola continued to publicly trust City's leadership after that episode and maintained the same position when the Premier League eventually brought its own charges in 2023.
The Spaniard also made clear that potential sporting punishment would not necessarily determine his future. In November 2023, when asked whether he would consider leaving if City were relegated because of the case, Guardiola said he would be more likely to stay if the club were in League One than if they were competing in the Champions League.
Those comments addressed a different question from his 2022 warning. Guardiola's position was that relegation or another sporting punishment would not automatically make him leave, whereas being personally lied to by the club's hierarchy would have been a different matter.
The latest verdict does not establish what Guardiola was told by individual City officials, nor does it show that he personally knew about or participated in any alleged wrongdoing.
Instead, the significance of his old comments lies in the contrast between the scale of the commission's findings and his continued public support for the club.
The Premier League's latest findings concern alleged financial misconduct between 2009-10 and 2017-18, including what the league described as sham commercial arrangements that inflated revenue and understated costs by more than £900 million. City strongly reject the findings and intend to challenge them through the appeal process.
With sanctions still to be determined, questions remain over the possible consequences for City's finances, league status and historical achievements.
For Guardiola, however, his position remains clear: despite the verdict, he continues to stand behind the club he managed for ten years and the people who run it.
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