WATCH: Pep Guardiola takes issue with question over provoking Vinicius Junior

Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola has always had a somewhat fraught relationship with the media in the Spanish capital, and it showed little sign of improving ahead of Manchester City’s latest clash with Real Madrid. Asked whether he would ask his players to provoke Vinicius Junior, he was blunt in his response.

It was put to Guardiola that City will be going against a Real Madrid side that has four players in danger of suspension for the second leg with a yellow card, Aurelien Tchouameni, Vinicius Junior, Eduardo Camavinga and Jude Bellingham. He was asked with Vinicius having a short fuse, whether he would instruct his side to provoke a booking for the Brazilian.

“How do you do that? How do you make it so that he doesn’t play the second leg? What do we have to do?” Guardiola said, cutting Monica Marchante off, who responded that they had to provoke a yellow card from Vinicius.

“Ahhh. You can forget about that. You can forget about it. What we have to do is play a good game. If somebody gets a yellow, it’s because it happens. I have never, in all my 14-year career as a manager, and I know you won’t believe me, but I have never said to my players to do this because they might get a yellow. But I’ll put forward all of the players I have coached as testimony.”

It would be no surprise to see Vinicius Junior toeing the line at the very least. He has served a suspension this season for disciplinary reasons, picking up five yellows in La Liga, the majority of which involved dissent of some sort. Guardiola will not be trying to exploit his ‘short fuse’ as Marchante termed it though, as he made quite clear.