Pep Guardiola: 'I still feel responsible for the Lyon loss but we do not have a Champions League mental block'

Pep Guardiola does not believe Manchester City have a mental block in the Champions League as the club bid to make it 10th time lucky in the competition.

City face Porto in their opening Group C match at the Etihad on Wednesday night, just over two months since slumping to a dismal 3-1 quarter-final defeat to Lyon in Lisbon that intensified the spotlight on the manager and his players.

It was their third successive exit at the last-eight stage - after previously being knocked out by Liverpool and Tottenham - under Guardiola, who insisted he took full responsibility for City’s recent European failures.

This is the 10th campaign in a row in which City have qualified for the Champions League but they have only reached the semi-final stage once - in Manuel Pellegrini’s final season in charge in 2015-16, shortly before Guardiola took charge.

But the Catalan remains convinced that City are still “close” to being able to win the competition and waved away suggestions they had developed a psychological barrier as he urged his players to find solutions to the “little gaps” that have blighted them.

“I have the feeling that we are close, every season when I analyse the way we went out and I felt we are close but, at the same time, we made some mistakes that make you feel we don’t deserve to go through,” Guardiola said.

“I don’t think it’s mental because I think this situation is more about desire and avoiding some mistakes we do.

“For clubs who are used to being every year in the last stages maybe it is easier but being in the quarter-finals for a long time and [qualifying] 10 times in a row is a good success for us but I know the reality of this club.

“I know that [after] winning domestic titles the next step is to make a step forward in the Champions League and, being there again, we have another good opportunity.

“When you review the games, even in Liverpool when we lost 3-0 [in 2018], or the game against Tottenham [last year] or against Lyon, always I had the feeling we are close, we are not far away.

“In the games absolutely none of them was better than us. There are little gaps but these little gaps we have to solve and we did not. When you don’t solve it it’s because you don’t deserve it.”

City’s defeat to Lyon was a particular disappointment, with Guardiola’s tactics inviting fierce criticism, and the manager said he still feels the responsibility of that now as he targets victory over Porto.

“It was a tough moment,” said Guardiola, who is still without the injured quartet of Kevin De Bruyne, Aymeric Laporte, Gabriel Jesus and Benjamin Mendy.

“I felt so responsible for this, how the club and players fought to achieve it, and I was not able to drive them. Still right now I feel responsible watching the game, so we have to accept the reality. We were not good enough.

“We didn’t play bad. We had really good moments and had our chances but made mistakes and in this competition you cannot do it to go through.

“The reality is we have not performed to the level we have to to get through in this competition. We have to accept it with humility… and when we accept this, it is the best way to improve and go through, start from zero again and try it again knowing we have to improve.”