Pep Guardiola has been heartened by his first talks with Manchester City owner Sheikh Mansour but is still under no illusions about the price of failure in English football.
Guardiola appears to be making progress in his first season at the Etihad after taking City to the third place in the Premier League table and to the brink of the Champions League quarter-finals ahead of Wednesday’s FA Cup fifth-round replay at home to Huddersfield Town.
City went on a four-day warm weather training trip to Abu Dhabi after beating Monaco 5-3 in Europe last week and Guardiola was impressed by what he heard from the Sheikh.