Manchester City had their most successful season under Pep Guardiola back in the 2022/23 campaign.
Specifically, this ended up being the best season in the club’s history, as City won the Premier League, FA Cup and Champions League.
Looking back over the squad that led the Blues to their three major trophies in that particular season, several of them have now made moves out of the club.
One of those players is Kalvin Phillips, who joined Ipswich Town on a season-long loan deal during the previous summer transfer window.
With this being his second loan spell away from the Etihad Stadium, the midfielder has now opened up about his time with Pep Guardiola’s side, specifically on how it felt to him to be a part of the Treble-winning squad.
Kalvin Phillips reflects on Treble-winning City campaign
While reflecting on his time at City in a recent interview with Sky Sports, Phillips gave this honest assessment about how connected he feels to the Manchester club’s Treble victory.
He said: “It’s amazing to say I’m part of a Treble-winning team, I’ve won the league twice. But when you’re not involved as much as you’d like to be, it doesn’t feel the same.
“It was an amazing time and moment, but I feel like had I played more, got more of a chance, it would have felt more special.”
Phillips opened up about why he left City on loan
Looking back over the Treble-winning season, which was Phillips’ first campaign at City after joining from Leeds United in a deal worth £45m during the 2022 summer transfer window, the Englishman only started four games in total.
| Kalvin Phillips – 2022/23 | Appearances | Starts | Minutes Played |
| Premier League | 12 | 2 | 291 |
| Champions League | 3 | 0 | 40 |
| FA Cup | 4 | 1 | 161 |
| Carabao Cup | 2 | 1 | 103 |
Back in October, following a disappointing loan spell at West Ham United last season, Phillips opened up about his latest City exit, saying this about why he joined Ipswich.
He said: “I think the main reason I came to Ipswich was just, my main ambition was just to get back playing football.
“And I think, yeah, just back to enjoying my football, because obviously I loved it at City. They’re the best team in the world. They’ve got amazing players and amazing people there.
“It’s just kind of draining when you know that you’re not going to play on the weekend and you’ve still got to go in and train as well as you can, and hopefully keep on trying to make yourself better and better every day.
“With nothing to look forward to on the weekend, it’s really hard and I just got to a point where I knew that I probably wasn’t going to play much because of the players that play in front of me, which I can’t really argue about.
“I kind of just made that decision that I wanted to just enjoy my football again and play football, not stress-free, but with less stress and fewer eyes on me, maybe.
Since joining Ipswich, Phillips has featured in seven Premier League matches for Kieran McKenna’s side ahead of their clash away at Nottingham Forest.
Now that the midfielder has admitted that while he enjoyed being part of City’s Treble-winning side, it would have been more significant for him if he had played a more prominent role in the team across the season, this shows how honest he is about his feelings in that particular part of his career.
