Paul Parker: Guardiola isn't panicking, but needs to adapt squad; Mourinho mustn't moan about hotels

Everybody knew that the Premier League was going to be a learning curve for Pep Guardiola. As much as the division doesn’t come anywhere near the Bundesliga or La Liga in a technical sense, I think he’s found out this is a tougher league to win because of the fact that one game is never the same as the next. It’s about adapting and he’s probably starting to understand that he needs different options in his squad.

It’s the same as how a racing car needs different tyres for different races and weather conditions. When they come out to the Far East and it’s 90-degree heat they’ll use a different kind of tyres compared with maybe 40-degree heat. City need to adapt like that too, and Pep needs to find a few more all-weather players.

He hasn’t even got to the tougher period of the year yet either, there’s all that for him to understand and learn. But I think he’s fully aware of it. His whole image is of a man who’s not panicking, I think he understands where he is.

The squad Pep took over at City was expensive, but it wasn’t as good as people thought it was. If you look at some of the players, they’ve been around a bit and are biggish names, but are they what he’s looking for? He’s always had younger players, back when he was coaching Barcelona B through to Bayern Munich when he signed Thiago Alcantara and brought Joshua Kimmich through, but I think he’s realised there isn’t that same mentality at City as what he’s had before. He needs to develop that, but I don’t think he’s in a panic mode at the moment.

Every game that City play, even West Bromwich Albion this weekend, is a massive game and he needs to bring in more players who are used to playing big games week in and week out. When he was in Barcelona he had players who were used to that – it’s about finding those at Manchester City now. It might take him another season or a couple of transfer windows to bring those sort of players in, but he’ll get there.

I think he’s looking for something different to Sergio Aguero though. You have to look at all the centre-forwards he’s had and Aguero isn’t really that kind of player.

For Tony Pulis to get the chance to face Pep this weekend – a proper old-school British coach up against one of the best tactical and technical coaches in the world – is something that he probably never thought he’d get the opportunity to do. It’s fantastic for him.

Tony is a typical English coach, the English school-teacher type. His methods are tried, tested and proven, everything about him is correct. If you’re going to model yourself as a manager I think you should look at Tony Pulis. He’s been successful in his own right at each club he’s been at. He’s never got teams relegated and always makes them difficult to beat.

Pulis' teams are never going to score a load of goals, but if he can get a centre-forward who can get double figures he’ll pat him on the back and love him to death. He managed to sign Salomon Rondon for West Brom and must have told him "you’re going to run maybe about nine miles every game, but I don’t know how many touches of the ball you’re going to get". But players are willing to do that so his man management skills must be very good as well.

Pep played an under-strength team in the derby on Wednesday, while Jose Mourinho went full-strength, so whatever happened he had to win that game. The United manager was in a position where if he lost everybody would get at him – it was imperative that he won, particularly after all that negative press about him and the hotel.

That was absolute rubbish.

It’s very self-centred from Jose and all me, me, me. He says he’s having it difficult, staying in the Lowry hotel and not really enjoying it, that he can’t really walk about because people are going to get in his face and want to talk to him. That’s not the right message to send.

I stayed at the Midland Hotel for six months when I first moved to Manchester, but I walked around and loved it. I loved living in the city.

I couldn’t believe how nice people were to me in the streets, saying hello and all that. I wasn’t used to that. In Essex if you walked past someone and they said ‘good morning’ you’d think they were some kind of weirdo. But people respected me moving up there and when you went out up there they would still respect your privacy.

What he’s said is a bit selfish. He’s got to think of others and where he is now. If you lose a game in the north of England, you can’t just disappear like you can in London. It’s a different feeling and he has to understand that.

If it’s better for his family to stay in London then that’s absolutely fine, but he shouldn’t moan about having to stay in a hotel, because there a lot of people who would love the opportunity for just a night in a luxury hotel, never mind living there!

Mourinho has still got issues in midfield and hasn’t yet found the right personnel to get the best out of Paul Pogba to free him up. He should look more at Michael Carrick and Morgan Schneiderlin, but if he’s talking about experience and a good head then there’s nobody better than Bastian Schweinsteiger.

Also, if I was Ashley Young I’d be wondering what on earth is going on. He’s brought in for Liverpool, has a decent game, but then is left out for Chelsea. Why do that? And why bring in Jesse Lingard for the game at City when he’s not been playing, then haul him off? There are players there that he doesn’t seem to want to rely on all the time and he needs to find a solution to that.

There were a lot of headlines earlier this week about some comments I made about Big Pete, but this is my column so it’s a good chance to set the record straight.

If you listen to what I actually said then you’ll realise the headlines have taken it completely out of context. Why would I come out with something like that now, years afterwards? It just doesn’t make sense. People do these silly things to try and sell the story and it’s a shame that people can write these misleading headlines any way they want.

The thing is; Big Pete and I have always had a good relationship from the years we worked together. His daughter and mine used to hang out when they were little – he was great with them – and we’re good friends. It would be disappointing for this week’s headlines to ruin that.