GUARDIOLA FINALLY DELIVERING CITY THE CHAMPIONS LEAGUE
It’s been eight years since Josep ‘Pep’ Guardiola lifted his second Champions League trophy, a continental drought that looks worse after Zinedine Zidane, that other bald midfield genius, won it in each of his first three seasons as Real Madrid manager. Every failure in the knockouts shocked onlookers and yet a consistent theme unites almost all of them, from Pep’s four semi-final defeats in a row with Barcelona and Bayern Munich to his two earlier exits as Manchester City manager.
His teams keep losing 180-minute ties in one 20-minute passage of play.
In 2013-14 Bayern conceded three goals to Real Madrid within 19 first-half minutes of the second leg – aggregate score 0-4; game over. A year later, they recovered from gifting Porto a flying start in the quarter-finals (2-0 down within 10 minutes) but left themselves a mountain to climb in the next round, letting Barcelona turn 0-0 into 3-0 during the first leg’s final 18 minutes. After Pep joined Manchester City, Monaco went ahead at the Etihad with two goals in nine minutes, then triumphed a month later thanks to two in 22. And in last season’s quarter-final, City suddenly folded to give Liverpool three goals in 20 minutes – this, a few months after they’d shipped three in 10 as they fell apart in their league fixture at Anfield.
Coming against quality opposition, such spells aren’t purely self-destructive, but Pep’s players panicking is undeniably a factor. Bayern allowed Sergio Ramos twin headers from set-pieces in 2014 – prompting them to overcommit in attack and concede on the break – and poor defending against Liverpool last year ended City’s season in Europe and unbeaten run in the Premier League. Time and again, these mini-collapses have done the damage over two legs in one calamitous burst, even if Pep’s men dominate the vast majority of the tie.
Fixing this problem isn’t easy, because momentum is huge in cup football. But it’s surely the biggest threat to City and Guardiola needs to solve it somehow.