The Reds were due to play City in the first Manchester derby to be played outside of the United Kingdom on Monday – but the weather conditions in China left the pitch unplayable and led to the match being called off.
Advertisement
Mourinho and Guardiola were fierce rivals during their times in charge of Real Madrid and Barcelona in recent years and are set to renew their rivalry this season.
“So I’m looking forward to it. We need a championship”.
The outcome Jose Mourinho is seeking above all others in Monday’s historic match against Manchester City is a clean bill of health for his United squad.
“The ones in the first plane were lucky because the plane was great and we land safely and we were in the hotel in good conditions to have dinner”.
But Guardiola is anxious that his players may be more susceptible to injury by playing on the sub-standard surface, and he says his priority from the match is now to avoid any casualties. No reason why. He will want to win and so will I, that’s all.
“The pitch is very bad and the condition of my players is more important than results”, he said.
Speaking at a news conference on Sunday, Mourinho said: “Of course I will shake his hand”.
Asked what he wanted from the game, Guardiola said: “No injuries”.
“Why not? Why should we not shake hands?”
“It has been a pleasure and an honour to experience such a warm welcome from the people and supporters here in Beijing, and we remain committed to playing here in the future”.
“Manchester City have all of their players, we have six, seven or eight, who played in the Euros”.
Mourinho now just wants to cope with the issues around the City match and get back to England safely. They lost 4-1 against Dortmund in a sweltering Shanghai earlier in the tour before flying onto Beijing where their team flight was diverted to Tianjin because of bad weather.
Advertisement
“[Travelling to China] is good for the fans and for the commercial side of things”.
