This week, Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola did something he rarely does. He apologised to one of his players. In his nine years so far at City , Guardiola rarely backtracks in public, preferring to keep his man management private. He will regularly remind reporters and watching fans that decisions he makes are only positive if City win games and they are deemed wrong if they lose. His trophy cabinet shows he mostly makes the right decisions, even if some players have fallen by the wayside as they grow unhappy at not playing. It is uncommon, then, that Guardiola will acknowledge he has made the wrong decision, but he made an exception to that rule at the weekend when discussing Jeremy Doku's lack of playing time. "I've been so unfair with him in the last games, because I remember the games against Spurs away and Brighton, for example," he said on Saturday. "Without him it would not be possible, but the only reason that they have not played lately is because we didn't attack in the last games, with wingers - we were more full-backs wide, and more players in the middle like Bournemouth. "But it's only my reason. I feel sorry for him and for other ones." The headlines wrote themselves: Pep Guardiola APOLOGISES to Man City player. His explanation is fair, and this is a case of breaking a general rule to keep a player happy and motivated. And there have been increasing examples in the last couple of seasons where Guardiola has made exemptions to try and elicit a response to a player unhappy at not being picked. Take Jack Grealish for example. "I'm so sorry he doesn't get the minutes that maybe he deserves," Guardiola said in February. "But [in] the end, the contributions from Jeremy or Savinho have been massive this season, this is the only reason why. It's not personal, or [that] I don't like Jack, or I don't have confidence in him." It was the same a month later on a recurring question about Grealish: "I feel so sorry for the players who do not play. When we have games every three days the rotation is easy but now I have to decide every game for the quality the players have." Guardiola has also used the stick with Grealish as well as the carrot. He has been warned to improve his output to regain his place in the team and if he does issue a public apology it generally comes to hard-workers who are not on the bench due to their application. He was genuine when apologising to Kalvin Phillips in December 2023 in extraordinary comments which condemned the midfielder's City career at the same time. "I feel so sorry for my decisions for him, I said many times. He doesn’t deserve not to give him minutes. I'm so sorry," Guardiola said. "It’s him I am asking for good personality, good character, thinking about the end. This is a perfect example. After that I have to give him something, I didn’t do that. It’s just because I visualise something, I visualise the team and things, I struggle a little bit to see him, that’s all. "It’s not because I am not pleased. I feel so sorry for him. It's a business, in the end I have to act professional." And when fans were calling for a teenage Phil Foden to get more minutes back in 2019, Guardiola had a similar apology to make. "He deserves to play. I want to give him minutes. Every time I don't play him, I am in front of him saying I'm sorry," said the boss. "But it's Kevin De Bruyne there, Rodri, Bernardo Silva, David Silva, Gundogan, I'm so sorry. I know the best way to grow up is to play minutes, but he's so young. "I don't know how many players that age play have played more minutes in the recent past, the minutes he has played the last season with us, but he's going to be an incredible player for us in the future. We trust in him a lot. But it is what it is." That particular comment was proven right, and then some. However it is not just motivation behind some of Guardiola's more notable apologies to his players. Very early in his City career, in August 2016, Guardiola reacted to a brace from Sergio Aguero at Stoke by publicly challenging him to 'help the team more with his movement and pressing. "You cannot be brilliant when you disappear when you [don't] have the ball," the boss said. "It's not enough to receive the ball from his team-mates, he has to help us in the first pressure and run a lot and help us a lot with movement." Aguero later revealed that the comments began the 'tension' between the club's greatest ever goalscorer and greatest ever manager. The Argentine went to speak to Guardiola in private to ask why he hadn't raised the issue in training, recalling that the manager offered an apology on the spot. When offering Phillips another apology last year, Guardiola showed he has learned his lesson from that Aguero incident, but having disclosed to the media that Phillips returned from the 2022 World Cup 'overweight', this was a sincere backtrack - particularly after Phillips admitted the comments knocked his confidence. "I'm sorry," said Guardiola. "I do apologise to him. I'm so sorry. I did speak about that. I never before said something here [to the media] without speaking to the player." He was sincere, too, when returning to comments made about Steven Gerrard in 2023 when he asked if the former Liverpool captain's famous slip in 2014 was City's fault when talking about their 115 alleged breaches of Premier League rules. A week later he said: "I apologise to Steven Gerrard for my unnecessary and stupid comments I said last time about him," he said. "He knows how I admire him and his career, what he has done for this country where I'm living and training. I am ashamed of myself for what I said because he doesn't deserve it. I truly believe in my comments in my previous press conference to defend my club, but I didn't represent my club well putting his name in these stupid comments. "I apologised to him personally but I have to do it here as well. I'm so sorry for him, for Alex his wife, kids, family because it was stupid." And there was another message to Liverpool when a video of City players singing an altered version of their 'Allez, Allez, Allez' chant having won the title race in 2019. The song in the video contained alleged references to the Hillsborough disaster and the attack on a Liverpool fan by Roma fans a year earlier. "It was not to offend the people about what happened in Hillsborough or the guy over what happened against Roma," he said. "You think, just for one second, you could imagine we try to offend about these tragedies of the Liverpool world? It's incredible. We were happy for ourselves. If someone was offended, I'm sorry, I apologise, but it was never our intention. To win the Premier League is difficult against one incredible contender." He also was quick to clarify a joke made this season when asked about a scratch on his face when he appeared to make a joke about self-harm in the middle of City's poor run. He took to social media for a rare post to say: "My answer was in no way intended to make light of the very serious issue of self harm," before directing anyone needing help to the Samaritans. Guardiola generally likes to keep the peace in the technical area, apologising to Sean Dyche in 2018 for making a 'yapping' hand gesture against Burnley, and also against Chelsea in 2016 when Sergio Aguero was sent off to prompt a melee next to the technical areas with Fernandinho sent off. Doku may be the latest to earn an apology from the boss - and while it doesn't happen often, he probably won't be the last.