Pep Guardiola says Kevin De Bruyne deserves PFA Player of the Year award
Sunday 22 April 2018 23:22, UK
Pep Guardiola thinks Kevin De Bruyne deserves to win the PFA Player of the Year award, citing his high-level consistency over the season.
De Bruyne starred once again for Manchester City as the Premier League champions swept aside Swansea City 5-0 on Super Sunday.
The Belgian got on the scoresheet, too, scoring a thunderous effort to cap a man-of-the-match performance for Pep Guardiola's men.
City's outstanding Premier League campaign to date has been noticed by their fellow professionals, with David Silva, Leroy Sane and De Bruyne up for the main PFA award along with Harry Kane, David De Gea and Mohamed Salah.
The Liverpool forward and De Bruyne are the two favourites for the award, which will be announced on Sunday night, but Guardiola thinks his star man deserves the award.
"If he doesn't win, then congrats to the guy that wins," he said.
"But in my opinion, there is no player better than him in terms of continuity, every three days, competitions, three days. Maybe the numbers say someone is better than him but this season, there has been no one better than him.
"That's my opinion but players can have another one. But in the end, in the summertime, we will be at home being champions."
Despite warnings on the big screen, City's fans rushed the pitch at the final whistle in celebration of their record-breaking title success that was confirmed last weekend.
The FA is likely to take a dim view of the pitch invasion, but Guardiola does not see it as an issue, saying he understood the outpouring of emotion from the fans.
"It's no problem," he said. "Football is an emotional game - I understand you have to be careful.
"When the fans want to share that they are happy, it's better for them to stay but I'm not going to tell them not to do that - they show how happy they are. That is the most beautiful thing. We felt that today that the fans were so happy."
