OLD TRAFFORD, MANCHESTER — A febrile crowd, a couple of early "reducers" from Diogo Dalot and Luke Shaw, and players in sky blue frequently having half as much time as they expected to do anything.
On Saturday, Manchester City ran into a derby-day ambush at Old Trafford. Well, they wandered aimlessly into one. Pep Guardiola's players didn't really seem to run anywhere with much purpose. Manchester United didn't open the scoring until Bryan Mbeumo's 65th-minute strike, but the die had been long cast by that point. United had three goals ruled out for offside, hit the post twice, and Gianluigi Donnarumma was by far the visitors' best player. The eventual 2-0 scoreline flattered an abject City.
"They were the better team," Guardiola conceded afterwards. "They had something we did not have. Today, we were not the level required to win these types of games. We had that energy four days ago against Newcastle [in the Carabao Cup], but not today."
It wasn't a great afternoon for Guardiola, either. An unfamiliar backline was missing this season's first-choice picks Matheus Nunes, Ruben Dias and Josko Gvardiol through illness and injury, with Nunes' surprise absence persuading the City boss to put some extra experience into his defensive unit by selecting Nathan Ake ahead of Nico O'Reilly at left-back.
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There was logic to that, but it felt a little like crossing fingers and praying that Ake, who was substituted during the closing stages of the impressive 2-0 win at Newcastle in the Carabao Cup semifinal first leg with a heavily strapped left leg, might pull up in good shape. In the event, the Dutchman had a particularly torrid afternoon. More significantly, the lack of either Nunes or O'Reilly in their starting lineup robbed City of the dynamism those attacking full-backs have lent to the play this season, something that is not in the skillsets of Ake or weekend right-back Rico Lewis.
The upshot was City dominating possession (68%) but often being ponderous. The aggressive 3-1-6 shape Guardiola has used in possession this season became more of a danger to his own team, who were picked off relentlessly on the counter-attack. It was certainly a brutal way to move Rodri back to full fitness, with the 2024 Ballon d'Or winner often left marooned out of possession and in the build-up.
How to score on the break, by Bruno Fernandes and Bryan Mbeumo ✒️@ManUtd pic.twitter.com/1dVGnXLWc5
— Premier League (@premierleague) January 17, 2026
These and other problems are things Guardiola and his coaching staff can fix as key men return to full fitness and new signings Antoine Semenyo and Marc Guehi — whose move from Crystal Palace is set to be confirmed on Monday — have the chance to bed in. Arsenal should be out of reach in the title race but insist on playing with their food, and there is plenty more to play for this season in the domestic cups and Champions League, where City can take a huge step towards guaranteeing a last-16 spot when they travel to Bodo/Glimt this week.
But there are also some things, no doubt grudgingly, out of Guardiola's control.
Old Trafford fury shows challenge facing Guardiola
The Old Trafford atmosphere — not always noted for its intensity, especially in recent times — was utterly ferocious. For this fixture, it felt significant. Often to the chagrin of City fans, for whom there has only ever been one show in town when it comes to local enmity, many United supporters will cite their battles with Liverpool as the biggest rivalry. Historically, with 40 English titles between them, it's hard to argue against this. Like all same-city rivalries, there is an element of joshing and micky-taking about the Manchester derby. But Saturday was different.
United fans liked to mockingly pity City during the Sir Alex Ferguson years, and the decade or so since has been a period of readjustment. For the 198th edition of this fixture, they found their frequency: one of righteous hate. "You cheating b------s, you know what you are!" Has been part of the derby soundtrack ever since the Premier League's weighty charge sheet for City dropped in February 2023. But it was sung with far more viciousness than gallows humour at the weekend.
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For a point of comparison, the atmosphere felt similar to those thrillingly charged games between Guardiola's City and Jurgen Klopp's Liverpool in 2018. Sure, there was backing of their own team — having nothing to lose after Ruben Amorim's hasty descent into unemployment, and the sight of returning club hero Michael Carrick, meant there was an element of Red Devils may care. But like an Anfield enraged by the manner of Raheem Sterling's 2015 decampment down the M62, this was an Old Trafford faithful who despised everything about the "cheats" from across town.
Those are cheating allegations that City stridently deny, as they always have, since the Football Leaks revelations of November 2018, since the Champions League ban of February 2020 and that being overturned by the Court of Arbitration for Sport five months later. Much of the Premier League case draws on a similar set of allegations.
It's been a long, long, wearying time. And Friday's reports of Guehi being close to joining City from Palace for a knockdown price of £20 million ($26.8m) drew a sustained vitriolic response online from supporters of various clubs, with Aston Villa and Arsenal among the most prominent. The emotional temperature inside Old Trafford did not feel unrelated. These lot will escape justice off the pitch, so let's give them some on it.
What a view 😮💨
— Manchester United (@ManUtd) January 18, 2026
🤳 @Snapdragon x #ShotOnSnapdragon pic.twitter.com/95iGukkji2
Why is there no Man City 115 verdict?
This isn't to suggest we should be producing tiny violins on City's behalf. At boardroom level, both the Premier League and City are culpable for not backing down from the nuclear option, never finding appropriate terms on which to settle after CAS and plunging headlong into deeply complex litigation that was always going to take a length of time completely unsatisfactory in the world of ever-moving sporting competition. The hearing finished in December 2024 and we are still without an outcome, rumours over when having largely dried up.
However, for Guardiola and a hastily overhauled squad after the two botched summer transfer windows after the treble, it gives added turbulence. After the Premier League charges dropped in February 2023, behind-the-scenes cameras captured Guardiola imploring his "warriors" to show what they were made of on the pitch. The siege mentality helped to fuel a run to the treble and the clip was one of the most shared from City's Netflix documentary series.
The issue is that, of those "warriors", Ederson, Kyle Walker, Kevin De Bruyne, Ilkay Gundogan, Aymeric Laporte, Riyadh Mahrez, Jack Grealish, Julian Alvarez and Manuel Akanji have all moved on. Dias, the most obviously vocal dressing-room presence, was absent at the weekend, while Ake and the yet more injury-riddled John Stones will likely go when their contracts expire in the summer.
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Eleven of City's first-team squad have joined within the past 12 months, meaning around half of the players in the dressing room of the club that has won six of the past eight titles have never touched a Premier League medal. Unlike the men listed above, 115 and all of its noise is not their fight. It didn't emerge when they were in the building; it's just part of the landscape, a weight for City that can never be fuel again until a verdict arrives.
Away games at Tottenham and Liverpool are on the agenda at the start of February. Two venues where City have typically struggled and two opponents having tough seasons, where the home fans will be desperate to make themselves feel better by giving the men in sky blue what for. It's a reality Guardiola and his players will have to steel themselves for, and fast.