Guardiola said that Manchester City will treat every remaining game of this season as a "final" and will strive to qualify for next season's Champions League.

Manchester City currently ranks fifth in the Premier League standings, a position that will ensure their qualification for next season's Champions League, but Chelsea and Aston Villa are only one point behind them, and the situation is extremely tense.

Guardiola said: "Now every game is a final. This is not complicated. We must win a lot of games to ensure that we qualify, because Newcastle and Villa are very strong, and Chelsea, Nottingham Forest and Fulham are also competing. Many teams have the opportunity to participate in the competition."

"So it's not a very complicated logic - if you want to be on that stage on Tuesday and Wednesday in the Champions League and compete with the elite, you have to win almost all of the games and we have a very difficult schedule ahead of us.

Guardiola attributed the team's ups and downs in performance this season to frequent injuries.

Guardiola added: "I've said it many times, the biggest problem is that we are missing players. We have too many injuries and it is almost impossible to be competitive in this situation.

"No matter what sport it is, like basketball, when key players can't play, the entire team will never be the same."

"We couldn't maintain the level we should have, we couldn't rotate, and there was not enough competition within the team. In the most critical period of the season - October, November, December and January - we had a game every three days, but the team didn't have enough physical strength and energy to fight these tough games."