Pep Guardiola pushes away Man City coaches in furious clash with fourth official

10 December 2023 , 14:58

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Pep Guardiola confronted fourth official Craig Pawson at half-time

Pep Guardiola was forced to push furious Manchester City staff members away as he remonstrated with fourth official Craig Pawson at half-time with his side trailing 1-0 against Luton Town.

The incident came just minutes after Elijah Adebayo had broken the deadlock for the hosts against the run of play.

Guardiola told three members of the Manchester City coaching team to leave Pawson alone as he spoke with the official. Guardiola could be seen responding with ironic laughter at Pawson's response as the cameras quickly panned away.

Sky Sports, who were covering the match, claimed that Guardiola's ire was due to the timing of Adebayo's goal, which came right at the end of two minutes additional time.

However, Adebayo's pointblank header was scored at 46:56 - just four seconds before the end of the allotted time.

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The 25-year-old's goal came right at the end of a half which saw the Premier League champions spurn a host of golden chances. Luton had Thomas Kaminski to thank after he superbly denied Phil Foden just minutes before the interval.

City headed into Sunday's match against the Hatters without a win in four league matches after dropping points against Chelsea, Liverpool, Tottenham and Aston Villa.

Join the debate! What did you make of Man City's performance vs Luton Town? Let us know here.

Guardiola and his coaching staff reacted shortly after Elijah Adebayo struck to give Luton the lead (Marc Atkins)

They were also forced to do without the services of star striker Erling Haaland, who is struggling with a foot injury. Worryingly, Guardiola was unable to offer a potential timeline on the Norwegian's absence in the build-up to the game.

When asked about Haaland, he explained to Sky Sports: "Bone stress reaction in his feet. After the last game vs Villa, he cannot play. I don’t know, week by week, day by day, we will see what happens."

Despite that, City fought back to get their title bid back on track in the second-half. Bernardo Silva restored parity with a pinpoint first-time strike from the edge of the box which curled away from Kaminski before Jack Grealish smuggled the ball past the Luton goalkeeper just three minutes later.

Dan Marsh