Pep Guardiola has insisted that no-one can take away the trophies that Manchester City won as he claimed the Premier League’s case against the champions is built on the jealousy of rival clubs.
City were hit with over 100 charges of financial rules on Monday and potential punishments could involve them being stripped of their titles.
But Guardiola is adamant no-one can take away their memories or their achievements. City have won six Premier Leagues, four of them under Guardiola, and the charges relate to events between 2009 and 2018.
Guardiola, who has vowed not to let the club down and said he is more determined than ever to stay, accepts some people will feel their titles are tainted.
But he said: “At the end, always we leave thinking what other people think about us. Forget about it. Think what we have done. No-one can remove it. The bad moments we leave, but it is not going to change. It was built from day one. We won a lot. We want to defend that position, until it is not possible.
“The Premier League will decide but I know what we won, and the way we won it, with the effort we put in. For something that happened in 2009 or 2010, I don’t how long ago it was, it is not going to change one second. They belong to us. Absolutely, they belong to us. Regardless of the sentence, they belong to us.”
Guardiola is not facing any charges himself but has been outspoken in his defence of others at the club and explained: “When I say I am proud of my owners, proud of my chairman for this time we’ve had together, I rely a lot in the past, now you cannot imagine. If they want me here I will be here.
“The results they can put me out, because it is a business and you have to win. But if they want me I will not let them down. And I want my players too, I want to convince them that what we have done we have done it. They won’t remove it.”
Guardiola remains aggrieved that, when City were charged by Uefa in 2020, nine other clubs wrote to European football’s governing body to urge them to ban his side from the Champions League.
And he feels envy is behind an issue again, saying: “That is part of the sport. When a team is winning you want to beat them. That is nice. It happens. But what these nine teams have done, I don’t forget it. They want the position in the Champions League for the big amount of money to pay for the stadiums they built.”
