‘I’m not a child’ – Ex-Man City, Arsenal star Nasri recalls heated row with ‘arrogant’ Guardiola

Samir Nasri has recalled how he had to tell “arrogant” Pep Guardiola to stop yelling at him like a “child” during his time at Man City.

The former France international made the move from Arsenal to Man City in the summer of 2011 for around £25m and went on to play for the Citizens for five full seasons.

Nasri won two Premier League titles and a League Cup during his time at Man City but it wasn’t all plain sailing with the current defending Premier League champions.

Guardiola only briefly managed Nasri as the pair didn’t overlap for very long with the Man City manager unhappy about the Frenchman’s weight.

And Nasri has revealed how he had to tell Guardiola to stop shouting at him as he’s “not a child” in one of their first-ever meetings.

“I went into it with him from our first meetings,” Nasri recalled to L’Equipe. “On the first day, he summoned me to his office and asked me: ‘What do you want to do?’

‘I tell him: ‘It’s up to you to tell me if you’re counting on me.’ He replied: ‘I’m counting on you if you’re really well in the head.’

“Then I do my first training, everything is going well, he is happy with me. The next day, Pep summons me again and there he yells at me about my weight.

“He found out because we were weighed every day. There, I said to him: ‘Reduce your voice, don’t yell at me, I’m not a child, I’m 29 years old.’

“Maybe my holiday was an escape for me, a time to do what I wanted to do because I was coming out of a difficult season [a hamstring injury kept him sidelined for four months in 2015-16] and because in my personal life a lot of things happened.

“And there, Pep answers me: ‘It’s true, I’m sorry.'”

Nasri played one competitive match under Guardiola before leaving that summer on loan to Sevilla for the rest of the season before eventually leaving for Turkish side Antalyaspor.

Speaking after leaving Nasri out of two tour matches in China in 2016, Guardiola said: “Sami arrived a little bit overweight but he’s much better now. Still there is a little bit of weight. Last season he was injured and we want to avoid that.

“The weight is so important. When you are not fit, danger is coming. You’re not fast enough or quick enough in the head.”

Previously speaking about Guardiola’s comments on his weight, former Man City midfielder Nasri said: “When I arrived Guardiola told me my weight should be 76kg. I had not weighed that since I played in Marseille, because in the Premier League there is always a programme to gain more muscle.

“‘He wanted players to be thin and physical. I arrived with four kilograms more than I normally should have.

“With Guardiola, if you have 2.5kg more, you can’t train with the group, so I trained by myself.”

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