Man City stars lose Pep Guardiola guarantee to add to season jeopardy

This season has seen a drop-off from Manchester City across the board this season. No player has improved their reputation over the past seven months and Pep Guardiola has also struggled as the Premier League champions have come up short too often.

A campaign that nobody at the club is used to living has set up an unexpected ending, with just one game a week basically between now and May given the Blues are out of Europe prematurely and don't have loads of extra fixtures to squeeze in.

It says a lot about how the season has gone that any bullish talk from Guardiola earlier on about how he'd love to have a week to prepare for games has now been replaced by the reality that it isn't leading to better results.

Fewer games is undoubtedly a problem for City's players even in a squad as small as they have - particularly with injuries. When they are gunning for glory in all competitions, everyone knows that a chance is just around the corner.

They may not start for four games in a row but that only covers a week-and-a-half, and they will almost certainly be brought in sooner rather than later because of the importance of squad rotation. Not any more.

With weeks between games now, Guardiola could feasibly pick the same XI between now and the end of the season. With no fitness concerns to worry about, a system based on meritocracy could throw up the same 11 names again and again.

And so while it may be true that the standards have slipped to the extent that players who make mistakes keep their places because of the lack of competition contrasted to previous years where outstanding performances could not guarantee the next start, fewer chances means more jeopardy.

The one guarantee in a City squad has always been that players