Friday 1 December 2017 21:26, UK
Manchester City boss Pep Guardiola has admitted he had regrets over speaking to Southampton forward Nathan Redmond at the end of their 2-1 victory on Wednesday.
Guardiola appeared to speak to Redmond in an aggressive manner, although the player himself took to social media a day later to confirm the comments were "complimentary" to his qualities, insisting nothing "negative or offensive" was said.
The FA have since asked for observations from Guardiola over what happened and speaking at his media conference ahead of the Nissan Super Sunday clash with West Ham - live on Sky Sports - the City boss confirmed he had meant nothing untoward in the exchange.
When asked if he regretted what happened, Guardiola said: "Yes. I cannot control myself. I have to do that, hopefully I can improve.
"What Redmond said in his statement, I admire him as a player and thank him for his comments.
"If people don't believe me, I don't know what we are doing here. We should cancel our press conference.
"When I give an opinion, I give an opinion. We could cancel our press conference and just play games but if they want to listen to me, I will do it."
Guardiola was also keen to stress his words to Redmond did not imply any criticism of Southampton boss Mauricio Pellegrino's tactics.
"I've played in my career against millions of managers and I will never judge the way opponents play against one of my teams because I don't like it when the other team's manager judges what I do," he added.
"I know that Pellegrino wants to win the game, definitely.
"It's so complicated when teams defend with 10 players in the box. I have faced this kind of teams a lot of times in my career and I have to think about how to beat them [when they play] in that way.
"I said to Nathan 'you have to attack because you have the quality to do that'.
"He [Pellegrino] was my teammate, I was at Barcelona with Mauricio, and in my career, in a press conference or on the pitch, I would never be disrespectful about what they believe they have to do to beat me."
Guardiola also took the opportunity to comment on the possibility of Raheem Sterling staying at the club for an extended period.
The club are set to open talks with top scorer Sterling over a new contract, Sky Sports News understands, and Guardiola admits he would like to keep the England international - who has scored 13 goals in 19 appearances this season - at the Etihad.
"It's not my business," added Guardiola. "But I think I was clear, we were clear, when Arsenal wanted him we said no, that's not going to happen, he's still young, we hope to make him happy and he can stay for longer, but it depends on the club and him.
"All the managers want to help their players because if they play bad we'll be sacked but all the credit is Raheem's."
Watch Manchester City v West Ham on Super Sunday. Coverage begins on Sky Sports Premier League and Sky Sports main Event at 3:30pm, after Bournemouth v Southampton.
