Manchester City vs Newcastle: Not even Pep Guardiola can explain his side’s problem with freak results

Twenty-six shots on goal at St Mary's was the most without scoring in the Guardiola era

Manchester City had 26 shots on Alex McCarthy’s goal during Sunday’s 1-0 defeat at Southampton. It was the most they have attempted without scoring during the Pep Guardiola era and - as well as Ralph Hasenhuttl’s side played - it was yet another freak result in a season that has been shaped by them.

City played well at St Mary’s, certainly well enough to avoid their ninth defeat of the top-flight season. Guardiola has never been beaten as many times in a single league campaign during his managerial career. City have, in fact, now lost more games this term than Ole Gunnar Solskjaer’s Manchester United.

The problem, Guardiola said on Tuesday, is “not converting our game plan or the way we played into results”, or in other words, failing to convert goal-scoring opportunities and conceding from the few clear-cut chances that you give up. Combine the two and you have the reason for the 23-point gap between them and newly-crowned champions Liverpool.

Freak results have been a problem all season long for City and Guardiola cannot easily explain why. “I was not able to solve this problem that we had since the beginning,” he admitted.

There have been plenty of examples, but one sticks in the craw. “I remember the game against Tottenham at home,” he said, thinking back to mid-August and this season’s second round of fixtures. “They made two shots on target and we made more than 20 and we draw.” Liverpool took a two-point lead at the top of the table that day and City never made up the lost ground.

That setback - its uncanny likeness to the Champions League defeat last year - has coloured City’s entire campaign. There are other examples, though. The defeat by Tottenham away from home was another, and much like Sunday’s at Southampton, as it was defined by a failure to convert clear-cut chances.

City's wastefulness in front of goal should not be exaggerated. For all their supposed profligacy, we are still talking about the Premier League’s top scorers. Their total of 80 goals is 10 more than the next-highest by Liverpool. City have actually slightly over-performed when it comes to finishing too, with that 80-goal total a shade higher than their league-best xG of 78.

Yet every now and again, there are occasions when City simply look like they could not hit a barn door. When they suffer a defensive calamity on top of that poor finishing, all their dominance of possession and neat intricate passing is for naught, and they end up on the wrong side of the result.

For another example, you only need to think back to the reverse of Wednesday night’s home meeting with Newcastle United.

At St James’s Park back in late November, City drew 2-2 with Steve Bruce’s side as Raheem Sterling and Kevin De Bruyne’s goals were cancelled out by Jetro Willems and Jonjo Shelvey respectively. Coming only a few weeks after a defeat at Anfield, it was another substantial blow to their hopes of retaining the title.

You could put it down to bad luck. City’s finishing was not especially poor. Neither of Newcastle’s goals came from major defensive lapses - Shelvey’s was struck from some 25 yards, for example - but other key moments counted against them. The failure to close Willems properly for Newcastle’s first and Gabriel Jesus’s inability to convert a presentable chance midway through the second half resulted in the points being shared.

On another day, City would have won that game comfortably. Yet they didn’t, and there have been far too many days like that this season for Guardiola’s liking.

“The commitment of the players is without a doubt still after two or three successful seasons - unbelievable - but we are in the point where we sometimes make mistakes,” he conceded on Tuesday. “We have to avoid it. In some cases, the lack of scoring goals, they punish us as a team.”

It happens, and it will not matter so much if it happens again this evening, but it is something for Guardiola to ponder on before the FA Cup semi-final against Arsenal a week on Saturday, and of course the Champions League quarter-final against Real Madrid next month.

“We can play like we play and [if] we are consistent in both boxes, we will have a big chance to go through to the final of the FA Cup and the quarter-final of the Champions League. But if it happens like against Southampton, Tottenham at home and away and Norwich away and we will be out and Arsenal will be in the final and Madrid will go through.

“This is the reality we have to accept,” Guardiola added. He knows one more freak result on the wrong night and City’s hopes of salvaging this season could be over.