‘Not fair’: Bernardo Silva accuses fixture planners of hindering City at Arsenal

Bernardo Silva has accused the fixture schedulers of lacking respect and common sense, saying they put Manchester City at such a physical disadvantage for Sunday’s 1-1 draw at Arsenal that it was “not fair” and “just not right”.

The City captain said he and his teammates could not be at their best level for one of the biggest games of the season after being asked to play in the Champions League on Thursday night; they beat Napoli 2-0 at home.

Silva said two days of rest in between the matches was not enough. Arsenal were given the Tuesday teatime slot for their Champions League tie at Athletic Bilbao, which they also won 2-0, meaning they had four clear days to prepare for City’s visit.

It was not the amount of rest that Arsenal had that bothered Silva; rather City’s lack of it. He said he would not have spoken out if his team had lost; he is conscious it might have sounded like sour grapes. But fortified by the result, which would have been even better had the substitute Gabriel Martinelli not equalised for Arsenal in the 93rd minute, Silva said three days of rest had to be the bare minimum.

“I am saying this because we didn’t lose … if we lost, I wouldn’t say this,” Silva said. “But the reality is we cannot come to one of the most important games in the season with such a disadvantage in terms of rest. It is not fair to play one of these games like this. It is just not right. It cannot happen.

“I wasn’t feeling in a perfect condition to play like this and people who have not played at the highest level don’t know how it feels to play a game like this. You need to be at your best condition. We saw [Abdukodir] Khusanov getting injured [for City and going off at half-time] because these games demand a lot.

“It is just frustrating that we couldn’t be at our best level simply because of the decision of someone that thinks it is fair to come away after two and a half less days than Arsenal.

“I felt the difference in the first half. If you play at the highest level you know that two days [of rest] playing against one of the best teams in the league, away, with the travel … you need at least one more day to recover. It doesn’t matter if Arsenal had four, five or six days, just give us one more day and then you make it an even game.”

Pep Guardiola asked Manchester City to defend deep at Arsenal, where he selected the same starting XI for a third game in a row. Photograph: Tom Jenkins/The Guardian

Silva did not make the direct link between City’s depleted stamina and their park-the-bus approach; Pep Guardiola had his players defend deep throughout and switched to 5-4-1 in the 68th minute as he looked to preserve the lead given to them by Erling Haaland’s early goal. But it was no great leap to make the connection. It did raise the question of why Guardiola named an unchanged XI from the Napoli game. He had fielded the same lineup for the 3-0 home win over Manchester United the previous Sunday.

This time last year, it was Arsenal who felt the disadvantage. Before the 2-2 draw with City at the Etihad Stadium on Sunday 22 September, they played at Atalanta in the Champions League on the Thursday night, drawing 0-0. City had played on the Wednesday night at home to Inter, also drawing 0-0.

Silva said: “I understand you have different competitions. And Uefa, the Premier League and the broadcasters want to make their money. We don’t mind playing every three or four days and we don’t mind playing 60 games [in a season] because we are used to that. But what we ask for is common sense because this is one of the biggest games of the season.

“And it is not about us. I don’t think that they are trying to make us lose a game. It could happen to Arsenal or Liverpool in a few months. But when you are playing an Arsenal v City or City v Liverpool or Liverpool v Arsenal, you need to have a bit of common sense, an understanding of these situations.

“Even if we were in better physical conditions, it would have been a very difficult game. We can lose any game in good conditions or bad conditions but we need the respect and the common sense to be at the same level to compete.”

Silva was asked what could be done to change the situation. Had the Premier League captains got together to make any representation? “We have tried,” he said. “They don’t listen to us. It is what it is. We would like to change something. But it never changes. For the fans, for the respect of the clubs and for the fairness of the competition, I don’t think what happened was good.”