After Manchester City won the Premier League for a record-breaking fourth time in a row, Rodri unleashed a vicious attack on Arsenal’s lack of a championship mindset.
Sunday’s 3-1 victory over West Ham sealed another title win for Pep Guardiola’s team, while Arsenal’s victory over Everton was only symbolic as they ended two points ahead.
After the trophy was raised, Spanish midfielder Rodri, who has been a key player in all four of those championship victories, explained what separates City from Arsenal.
He brought up the goalless draw that occurred on March 31 between the two title rivals at the Etihad, where Mikel Arteta’s team was positioned more to annoy City than to win. Throughout the game, they only had 27% of the possession.
At that time, the result allowed Liverpool to move two points clear at the summit, with third-placed City a point behind Arsenal.
At that point, third-place City was one point behind Arsenal, while Liverpool had moved up to the top of the standings with the victory. But in the end, City’s championship brilliance was evident once more as they won each of the next nine league games to surpass both Arsenal and Liverpool and take the top spot.
How can City still be so focused on winning? Rodri answered to Optus Sport.
‘To be honest, I think it’s in here [points to his head]. It’s the mentality.
‘[There are] great players all over the league, all over the clubs.
‘Arsenal also they deserve [to win], they did an unbelievable season, but I thin the difference was in here [points to his head again].
‘When they came here, they faced us at the Etihad, I saw them and said: “Ah, these guys, they don’t want to beat us, they just want a draw.”
‘And that mentality, I don’t think we would do it the same way.
‘And we caught them. At the end, if you give us one point, we will win the last seven, eight games even though it’s so tough. So I think [the title win] comes down to mentality.’
When asked if he thought City would win a championship following that goalless match in late March, he continued, saying: ‘We believed. But you believe you did it, and we know how tough it is to do it.
‘We have to go out on all the pitches, the Tottenham game we had never won there so it’s not easy to implement this.
‘But every season, the manager, the players, find a way to do it. Even myself, comparing my first season I came here to now, you grow a lot in this sense [mental strength].’
On Sunday, Rodri became the first player in 50 Premier League games to go 50 goals without a loss. City had already won two of their games thanks to goals from Phil Foden.
