Pep Guardiola's Message: Win So Well That VAR Doesn’t Matter

Pep Guardiola has lived with VAR long enough to know one thing: if you leave the game in its hands, you invite chaos.

As the Premier League reels from another weekend dominated by replays and drawn lines – this time West Ham’s stoppage‑time equaliser at Arsenal ruled out after a long VAR delay, a call that shook both the title race and the relegation battle – the Manchester City manager cut through the noise with a blunt message to his players.

Win so well that VAR doesn’t matter.

“We lost the two finals of the FA Cup because the referees didn’t do their jobs they should do, even the VAR,” Guardiola said, still stung by back‑to‑back defeats in the 2024 and 2025 showpieces. “When this happens it is because we have to do better, not the referees or VAR.”

It was a rare, pointed rebuke. But it quickly turned back on himself and his team.

“I never trust anything since I arrived a long time ago,” he added. “Always I learned you have to do it better, do it better, be in a position to do it better because you blame yourself with what you have to do, because (VAR) is a flip of a coin.”

Old wounds at Wembley

Those scars run deepest at Wembley.

Two years ago City were stunned 2-1 by Manchester United in the FA Cup final, a defeat that still rankles. Guardiola felt his side were denied two penalties, both involving Erling Haaland – first under a challenge from Lisandro Martinez, then after contact from Kobbie Mainoo. On another day, with another set of eyes in Stockley Park, the story might have changed.

Last season brought another jolt. Crystal Palace, unfancied and fearless, took the trophy with a shock win built on Dean Henderson’s defiance. The goalkeeper even saved a penalty, yet Guardiola’s frustration centred on an earlier flashpoint: Henderson handling outside his area and staying on the pitch.

Those moments sit in the same mental file as West Ham’s late anguish at the Emirates. Different games, same sense of a sport increasingly decided by slow‑motion and drawn lines.

Guardiola’s response is not to campaign. It is to demand.

“Do it better” – the only message

City face Palace again on Wednesday night, this time at the Etihad, knowing a win would slice Arsenal’s lead at the top of the table to two points. The margins are thin. The manager’s instructions are not.

“You have to do better and better for yourself, and that is focusing on Crystal Palace for us,” he said. “Of course it is not in our hands in the Premier League. Always I say to the players, ‘Do it, do it, do it better’.”

The mantra is relentless. Lose focus, lose control. Leave anything to chance – or to VAR – and you live with the consequences.

“I always learned that when you lose the focus, you are in a dangerous situation,” Guardiola said. “The only thing we can do is do it better, that is only in your control.”

So City go into another pivotal night not pleading for breaks or protection, but chasing a performance that drowns out controversy. In a title race balanced on a knife edge and a league gripped by VAR fury, Guardiola’s challenge to his players is brutally simple.