Football

Is Pep Guardiola a failure?

Published

6 years ago

February 6, 2019

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‘The one thing the Premier League will do is test every single thing about you,’ writes Stan Collymore – ‘the man who always speaks his mind’ – in the Daily Mirror. He is writing about Everton coach Marco Silva but he cannot possibly get through a whole column without the most bizarre of digs at his usual target. It turns out his mind is largely full of shit about the Manchester City boss.

‘If you don’t believe me look at Pep Guardiola.’

You mean Premier League champion Pep Guardiola? The man whose City team has just broken almost all of the Premier League records? That Pep Guardiola?

It turns out he does mean that Pep Guardiola – the same Pep Guardiola that prompted this from Collymore in 2016:

‘If he thinks he’s going to turn up and outplay everybody in the Premier League, and that teams…are going to let his Manchester City side have the ball for 90 per cent of the time and pass pretty patterns around them so they can get a result, then he is absolutely deluded.

‘In fact, he is beyond deluded.

‘And if he thinks he doesn’t need to teach tackling or one-on-one combat in training then he’ll be going back to Spain with his tail between his legs.’

Well he’s still here. And doing really rather well. Or is he? It turns out that actually it’s been going really badly…

‘Recognised as one of the top three or four managers in the world over the last decade, he could be heading into his fourth English campaign in August having won just one league title and no Champions League trophy.’

Well he could. Or alternatively, he could end his third English campaign – for we have checked and it turns out we are still actually watching that third campaign – having won two-thirds of the Premier League titles he has contested. And actually, his Manchester City side are the favourites to win that Premier League title, as well as the Champions League, the FA Cup and the Carabao Cup. It doesn’t feel like a failure.

It’s odd, by the way, that Collymore has chosen not to list the League Cup as one of Guardiola’s triumphs in England, as he wrote this about Mauricio Pochettino and his disdain for domestic cups just last week:

‘One of the greatest managers in recent history who we’ve given a lot of stick to was Jose Mourinho.

‘At Chelsea, what did he target? The League Cup. Coming so early in the season it is a trophy that can get you off and running…

‘…A manager that wants to go on and manage Real Madrid, Manchester United, or any one of the big boys, should be talking up every single trophy including the League Cup.’

Unless you’re Pep Guardiola. And then it’s just a piece of shit and you could be heading into your fourth English campaign having basically won nothing at all.