Pep Guardiola, Manchester City’s defining face is unable to bear the brunt of multiple key players unavailable due to injuries.
Yet, Manchester City managed to get a 2-0 win against the bottom placed, Wolves, to keep themselves on the race for the title, 4 points away from the first place.
During the post-match press conference, talking about the struggles he is having while assembling the team with the limited players available, Pep mentioned a strange line, which he had never said before during a press conference.
Manchester City’s mainstays such as Josko Gvardiol, Ruben Dias, John Stones, Jeremy Doku are all out of availability due to various injuries.
This had limited Pep to play the available players out of their position, even though they did not match the profile needed for the game against Bodo/Glimt, last week in the Champions League.
The result was not in favour of the Sky Blues, as Bodo Glimt produced less than an upset but more dominating win with a 3-1 scoreline.
The Spaniard addressed the issues he faced during the game during the post match conference of their Premier League win against Wolves.
Talking about the structure of Bodo Glimt, he told that they were so narrow and compact with a 4-4-2 structure with no space in the central areas.
And to benefit from the wing play, he mentioned that every one vs one specialist winger from his team were unavailable. He said –
“Do you know how Bodo play? 4-4-2, so narrow. Like Villarreal. When the team is so narrow, where are the spaces? For the wingers, going one against one. Do you know how many wingers we had against Bodo? Zero. With that shape, when we arrived there with Nico O’Reilly or Rayan Ait-Nouri who was exceptional, it’s not the same if we have Savinho, or Doku, or have – inshallah – Oscar Bobb. All the wingers that we have. We struggle a little bit. Why? Because we don’t have the team.”
While mentioning names like Jeremy Doku, Savinho, he added the word “Inshallah” before mentioning Oscar Bobb.
Guardiola uttering Inshallah in a press conference was never seen before and yet being a non muslim utter it with that clarity had fans spiral into conspiracies.
Must say it rolled off the tongue fabulously https://t.co/OLyp8r5TOh
— george (@StokeyyG2) January 24, 2026
This app will be in meltdown the moment he says “Wallahi” 😭😭😭
— Mirwanovich (@Mirwanovich) January 24, 2026
Say it, Yusuf! https://t.co/s0HTunn0FS
Inshallah una. Gaffer kills me 🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣🤣 pic.twitter.com/wWGnUTN9Ta
— DSK (@0161Darren) January 24, 2026
The main banter topic was about how Pep Guardiola is embracing the muslim culture and using terms related to it, mid season, so that he could be backed with large funds for the transfer window, from the famous Sheik owners of Manchester City.
Changing religion mid season to ask Allah for 500 favours because daddy Sheikh said no more https://t.co/cVHVVIJqAd
— PD (@1_2spaces) January 24, 2026
Playing mind games with the owner of the club https://t.co/iK5H0ZUSWM
— gooner G (@goonerks) January 24, 2026
A specific section of the Twitter fans were worried about the normalization of the term, with the word associated to something sacred in the Muslim religion.
The trend of non-Muslims saying Islamic phrases going viral needs to stop being a thing. Stop cheapening the meaningful aspects of our deen for meaningless engagement. https://t.co/yFHpeyUu2d
— Na'eem (@naeemibnf) January 24, 2026
While many speculations revolve around the word usage, it is seen to be casually used by Pep, with a small hopeful intent of having his injured players back.
Nevertheless, the idea of mocking the religious sentiments of different ethnics is nothing to be dealt sportively.
