Pep Guardiola pre-Arsenal press conference

Michael Plant provides the latest from Manchester City ahead of the Premier League clash against Arsenal.

Transcript

00:00Michael Bland coming to you from outside Manchester City's media centre where this

00:04afternoon Pep Guardiola held his pre-match press conference ahead of the

00:07weekend's game against Arsenal. Of course a huge game, a high-profile match against the

00:11top two sides in the Premier League but Pep Guardiola speaking this afternoon

00:14I suppose he was keen to stress that in his eyes it's not a huge game in terms of the

00:18title race and will ultimately not decide where the title ends up. Just five

00:22games into the season I suppose it's difficult to argue with that sentiment

00:26but he did speak at length about Arsenal and he said obviously the side that

00:29finished second in the Premier League for the last two seasons finished just

00:33behind Manchester City of course. He feels that this is the best version he

00:36has seen of Arsenal during his time at City. High praise really considering how

00:42well they've done over the last couple of years but they've made a couple of

00:44important summer signings bringing in Calafiori, Moreno and of course Raheem

00:48Sterling the former Manchester City player and Guardiola thinks they're

00:51going to be even better for that and he actually referred them as a complete

00:55team and said they are possibly one of the best teams in the world when it

00:58comes to set pieces. But I think the big story coming here today was wondering

01:02whether Kevin De Bruyne was going to be

01:05available to play against Arsenal and Guardiola gave a bit of a vague

01:09response and seemed to say that you'll see after training but said there is a

01:12possibility he will be available. Of course he picked up that injury against

01:16Inter Milan on Wednesday night so we'll have to see if he is available and he is

01:20going to be involved but Guardiola also referenced that Phil Foden is back, is

01:23available and is ready to play 90 minutes which is very encouraging

01:26considering the kind of stalled start to the season I suppose he's had following

01:31the late run at the Euros but interesting press coverage for Pep Guardiola

01:34today I think he seemed to imply that he expects it to be perhaps another

01:38defensive game here between two teams who produced one goal across the two

01:42Premier League games last season but it's a game that it's going to be highly

01:46anticipated watched all across the world and one that certainly

01:49City would love to win even at this early stage of the campaign.