Jeremy Doku confident Manchester City are seeing a ‘better version’ of himself | OneFootball

Jeremy Doku believes he is starting to show glimpses of his best after being trusted by Pep Guardiola to express himself.

The Belgium winger produced an electric display, which included scoring the opening goal, as Manchester City thrashed Italian giants Juventus 5-2 in the Club World Cup on Thursday.

The 23-year-old looked sharp and exciting in a team which appears to have been rejuvenated by the arrivals of new faces.

Nobody at City is getting carried away by one performance, but the side did look more like Guardiola’s all-conquering outfit of recent years than the one that laboured through most of the 2024-25 campaign.

Doku said: “Obviously it was a good game, we won and we were together from the start to the end and we scored some nice goals. We finished top of the group and we are happy.

“I don’t know (if we are back to our best). We just look game by game and this was a good game and we looked a bit more like how we were before, and we will try to produce in every game like this and in every performance.

“I feel free and enjoying my football, of course. I can still improve on certain aspects but when I play free and with the right mind, with the trust of the coach obviously, then you see a better version of me and now you are seeing a glimpse of it.”

Asked further why he feels so free on the pitch, Doku said: “I think it’s more to do with my faith, I’m more occupied with my faith and I just give all the glory to my Lord and our saviour Jesus Christ.”

City’s victory over Juve at Orlando’s Camping World Stadium ensured they avoided Real Madrid in the last 16 and they will now return to the same venue to face Al Hilal of Saudi Arabia on Monday (2am Tuesday BST).

Manager Guardiola is treating the tournament as the start of the 2025-26 season in order to make a clean break from the disappointments of last term.

The approach so far seems to have been vindicated with new signings Rayan Cherki, Rayan Ait-Nouri and Tijjani Reijnders making positive first impressions.

“Obviously there are a lot of games but we are here now, it’s a nice tournament and we are just trying to win,” said Doku.

Another positive has been the return of key midfielder Rodri, who made his first start since September against Juve.

Doku said: “Having him back in the team, you can see the difference and see how important he is.

“After such a long period of injury, in the first game back starting against a big club, he showed his qualities and he had a lot of impact.”