Manchester City’s hopes of winning the Club World Cup have been quashed, as Al-Hilal edged a seven-goal thriller in Orlando to book their place in the quarter-finals
Bernardo Silva admitted crashing out of the Club World Cup was like being knocked out of the Champions League. And Manchester City have got just 46 days until the start of their Premier League to solve all of their familiar failings which saw them finish the campaign empty-handed.
The Club World Cup was their last hope of salvation but they fell short in the United States when they suffered a shock 4-3 defeat to Al-Hilal in what will go down as the biggest result in the Saudi club’s history. City captain Silva was searingly honest as he admitted they were too open defensively, they have made a habit of losing when teams hit them on the break and they still have major problems to solve.
Silva also admitted the players are still waiting to discover their schedule and how much holiday they can take before they kick off their new Premier League season against Wolves on Saturday, August 16. It has also delivered a major blow to Pep Guardiola’s optimism that City had put last season’s problems behind them by gelling together in the United States.
They have spent nearly £300million in 2025 and missed out on a mega pay day in the Club World Cup as the winners will pocket £97m in prize money. Instead, City will fly home feeling flat and a lot of neutrals will be wondering whether Guardiola – arguably the best and most successful manager in the Premier League era – can rebuild the team which is used to winning every trophy.
Silva said: “It does feel a little bit like going out of the Champions League, yeah. No one wanted to lose, we are very used to not having holidays unfortunately because the schedule is crazy. But when we are in a competition we take it very seriously and we had a lot of ambition for this Club World Cup and we wanted to win it.”
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City’s problem last season was they were exposed defensively. They finished the season strongly, they showed flashes of brilliance in thrashing Juventus in the Club World Cup but they looked vulnerable against Al-Hilal.
Rodri is still coming back from injury and suffered another setback as he came on as a substitute only to be subbed off himself. Ilkay Gundogan is surely on his way.
Kyle Walker and Jack Grealish can both leave. Ruben Dias struggled badly. City want to play a high defensive line but, since Walker lost his place and his pace, they lack a defender with enough speed to get back to recover.
Silva admitted that Al-Hilal beat them by playing the way all teams beat them. They sat deep, defended resolutely – and then hit City on the break. It is a problem which they could not handle.
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Silva added: “There was always a feeling of danger coming from them when they recovered the ball in transition and their counters. The amount of time we allowed them to run was bad for us, they punished us.
“We allowed them to run way too many times, we didn’t control the offensive transitions as well as we should have and apart from that we had chances, we scored three goals and we could have scored five or six.
“Most teams that beat us play this way. We are very used to playing teams like this. We’ve played against teams like this for eight or nine years and we didn’t control those situations.
“I’ve had a lot of disappointments and a lot of great things happening to me in my career. So whatever happened in this competition, in one month when we start the Premier League, we will forget and focus on having a great season.
“We’ve had a lot of frustrations in the past as well, and we managed to come back. We’re going to try and do that again, knowing that we have a lot of competition, but we’re going to work very hard.”
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The FIFA Club World Cup will see 32 of the world’s best club teams including Man City, Chelsea, Real Madrid, PSG and Bayern Munich play across 63 games from June 14-July 13.
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