The fact that everyone has been crap since he joined helps a lot.
'Pep' Guardiola sack watch
- Thread starter Classical Mechanic
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Not sure how that ties into my post or is comparable to United when SAF came.
To clarify, are you genuinely comparing City post Pellegrini to United when SAF arrived? If so, happy to dissect this into oblivion.
Such a comparison would be impossible because football has changed a lot in the 30 years separating those two scenarios. I was merely pointing out that United were not exactly relegation strugglers when SAF took them over. They got him in because Big Ron couldn’t get over the hump. I’m pretty sure that one year they won the first ten matches of the season and opened up a healthy lead in the table, only to fall apart and finish fourth again.
We were actually in the relegation fight if I remember my history when SAF came in but agreed we were a solid if not spectacular club at that time
City pre Guardiola had won everything City post Guardiola has won, they were the richest club in the league, they’d been preparing for Pep’s arrival long before he came. To compare the two platform with reference to their respective abilities to compete in the CL is so one sided it’s hard to even call it debate worthy.
FYI Think that season you are referencing was when Leeds won the league.
I don’t think you were in a relegation fight but I could be wrong.
This is the thing about comparing the platforms and how football has changed. It’s apples and oranges. As many people have pointed out in this thread, Pep’s task when taking the City job was to win the Champions League. That’s what people keep telling me on here anyway. So the fact that City had won the league before he came was neither here nor there.
Fergie’s remit wasn’t to win the Champions League. In fact there was no Champions League. There was no ‘top four’. People scarcely cared about any football that was being played outside of England. Of course the European ban further fuelled this insularity.
The goalkeeper could pick up back passes. Offside was behind the last man. A lot of football teams doubled as drinking clubs (including Atlkinson’s Man United). You were still allowed to scream in players’ faces at half-time and knock over the tray with cups of tea as a motivational tool. That might not wash too well with today’s pampered millionaires (what would it be today, a tray of glasses of vitamin water?!)
The league was still mostly British players. You weren’t able to watch the Bundesliga or whatever every day on TV like you can now. Your rivals as a top English club were not Real Madrid and Juventus, but Liverpool and Everton. That’s where your focus was.
Fergie’s task at that time was to dominate England, which he duly managed after a few false starts. Only then did the attention turn in earnest to Europe as the game became more cosmopolitan in the 90s and beyond. Pep’s task from the off was to dominate Europe, in a world where every single action of every single player and team is analysed endlessly on video by opponents. As yet, he has failed to achieve this goal.
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Indeed
You insinuated that Pep joined a City team that has been favourites to win the CL, and that wasn't the case. Him going there and their 100points season is what made them bookies favourites.
I said: "City are among the favourites/outright favourites since he joined in the CL" what part of that do you disagree with?
You have to admit then that if they've become favourites since he arrived, it's because of him rather than because he inherited a great team as some tend to claim.
I don’t understand when this was ever debated re CL favourites.
He did inherit a great team though - I find it weird people try to make out he didn’t
City was probably on the same level for the bookies as the likes of PSG/Atletico and behind Real/Barca/Bayern and became one of the favorites during their 100 pts season because they did very well in the league. Maybe the fact that the latter three dropped off and literally almost half a billion worth of transfers (net) were invested in that already really good squad could also have also pushed their chances though, I'm not sure... Imagine investing that much money in a squad like current PSG or likes, that's literally almost three Mbappés FFS...
Pellegrini final season they reached the semi finals. They only lost 1-0 agg to Real Madrid the eventual winners so difficult to not take them serious. Kun netted 29 that year. They still had Zaba, Vinny, Fernandinho, Raheem, KDB, Silva, Yaya as their base, amoung others
Exactly - so when you assess it without the aesthetics of his football - Pep took 5 years to better Pellegrini in the CL and against much weakened CL field at that. He took Pellegrini's squad, which was already amongst the best around, albeit not the best, and then spent another what half a billion pounds on players.
Yes. I think even Pep realizes his relative failures in the CL with City. Monaco beat them 2nd round in 2017, Liverpool in 2018 beat them 5-1 on aggregate in the quarters ( despite City winning the league), then they were knocked out by Spurs the year after in the quarters then Lyon in the Semi. In every defeat they were favorites and sometimes overwhelming. you are correct it took 5 years to better Pellegrini and in some defeats it was his own decisions. I am sure he will admit he is disappointed. He was fortunate to be in the end of the Messi Ronaldo dominance so was probably his best chance.
Such as what? Always having the best team?
Go listen to all the great players he's coached as well as other coaches and specialists talk about him if you want to know, unless you think they all don't know what they're talking about and that you know better.
He's the GOAT. for the past 8 seasons he hasn't managed to win the CL as its difficult to win. Doesn't matter if you have the reigning champs, semi finalist + biggest budget (1billion+ Euros) and are favourites in every tie, it's called the champions league so it's difficult to win it with different teams/players/generations. I doubt a single manager has won it with different sets of players
Mourinho (Porto and Inter)
Fergie (99 and 08)
Heynckes with Real and Bayern
Hitzfeld with Dortmund and Bayern
Mourinho too.
SAF too, post was about winning with different sets of players. Apart from one or two players, it was completely different set of players.
Ancelotti too with Milan and Madrid
The only tactic English teams are trying to emulate is his playing out from the back style. The majority are doing this with disastrous consequences. To implement this tactic successfully you need to have a GK & Defenders who are very good with the ball at their feet. This costs money which most teams don't have.
It's much like the narrative that Pep has proved possession football works in the PL. He has proven it to work but has had to spend £800 Mill adding to an already good squad to do it.
I don't see how any of this contradicts what i said. It's not even up for debate that he has influenced the way the game is been played from top rich clubs to amateur clubs world wide.
This reason is why he's regarded so highly, not just because he wins trophies. Other coaches win trophies too, but there's a reason they aren't praised as much as Pep is.
I understand that it's opinions and all, but having him ahead of SAF should be a bannable offense on this website. Joking aside, bar City I don't think he was even the GOAT at his previous clubs he's managed.
Barcelona yes.
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This. Would love to see a Venn diagram of Cult of Pep, BDL, and Barca fans on the Caf. Imagine we'd see quite a lot of overlapping.
While I think the BDL does not exist I understand which posters you mean. And I do not think most of them see Pep as that special. He failed to win the CL, that is a stain on his work in Germany.
Basically the fans of clubs he coached who can tell how he improved their clubs
You are the outlier, pretty much all of the people in Munich that I know are saying that he's a world-class coach, but everyone agrees that he'd not be able to do the turnaround that Flick did, and would choose someone likes Nagelsmann over him. For all the great football in the league, he's been rather underwhelming for us in Europe and we couldn't have offered him the financial possibilities that City has, so it's a win-win I guess.
Hé was so underwhelming that the club wanted him to stay? Are the players in City team individually better than that of Bayern?
He was good, so it made sense that they wanted him to stay. But in the end he did not do enough to be considered amongst the greatest ever for Bayern. Only European titles can grant you that status and it was realistic to think he could win the CL with Bayern, he just did not.
Do you even try to read the posts you are replying to, or is it just scoffing at anyone even remotely seeming to not praising Guardiola as the best coach of all time? He was rather underwhelming in Europe, yeah, I don't think that's even remotely debatable. He had us played great football in the league though, smashing teams left and right with the best Bayern squad of all time during his three years. And no one believed we were able to challenge for the CL during the Kovac years, that Flick turnaround was miraculous and the way we smashed even the big teams during that year was something that Pep simply never did for us, even with a better squad. And yeah, even though I actually do see City's squad as a bit stronger than ours, I only said that we wouldn't have been able to offer him the same financial possibilities that City had. Pep even indirectly criticized our bosses for that. We've had one or two big transfers during those years (Hernandez for €80m, Sané for €45m), but compared to City's spending, those are peanuts.
Pep is a world-class coach, but the "cult following" is pretty insane
And I think there is a good reason why Pep does not have a (big) cult following in Germany. When we look at the last 4 CL finals, there were from Germany Klopp (2x, 1 win), Tuchel (2x, 1 win), Flick (1 win) so the so called "BDL" has three coaches who grew up in the BL to celebrate who all did more than Pep on the highest stage in the last years and (in some campaigns) got to that point by beating Pep.Do you even try to read the posts you are replying to, or is it just scoffing at anyone even remotely seeming to not praising Guardiola as the best coach of all time? He was rather underwhelming in Europe, yeah, I don't think that's even remotely debatable. He had us played great football in the league though, smashing teams left and right with the best Bayern squad of all time during his three years. And no one believed we were able to challenge for the CL during the Kovac years, that Flick turnaround was miraculous and the way we smashed even the big teams during that year was something that Pep simply never did for us, even with a better squad. And yeah, even though I actually do see City's squad as a bit stronger than ours, I only said that we wouldn't have been able to offer him the same financial possibilities that City had. Pep even indirectly criticized our bosses for that. We've had one or two big transfers during those years (Hernandez for €80m, Sané for €45m), but compared to City's spending, those are peanuts.
Pep is a world-class coach, but the "cult following" is pretty insane
3 semi finals (with one against Athletico were Bayern were extremely unlucky given that they completely outplayed Athletico? was underwhelming? Bayern is by far the best team in the league, i doubt the club wanted to keep him just because he was good in the league.Do you even try to read the posts you are replying to, or is it just scoffing at anyone even remotely seeming to not praising Guardiola as the best coach of all time? He was rather underwhelming in Europe, yeah, I don't think that's even remotely debatable. He had us played great football in the league though, smashing teams left and right with the best Bayern squad of all time during his three years. And no one believed we were able to challenge for the CL during the Kovac years, that Flick turnaround was miraculous and the way we smashed even the big teams during that year was something that Pep simply never did for us, even with a better squad. And yeah, even though I actually do see City's squad as a bit stronger than ours, I only said that we wouldn't have been able to offer him the same financial possibilities that City had. Pep even indirectly criticized our bosses for that. We've had one or two big transfers during those years (Hernandez for €80m, Sané for €45m), but compared to City's spending, those are peanuts.
Pep is a world-class coach, but the "cult following" is pretty insane
Other than Debruyne and Dias (after the season he's had, not before), which other City player walks directly into that Bayern team?
Did he really improve Bayern significantly? Hadn't they won the treble the season before?
They had. He ensured a level of dominance over the league that Bayern did not have before, so in that regard he improved them.