Origins of intense Pep v. Jose rivalry explored in detail

AS IS their wont, the tabloid press love to build up a good rivalry between sporting figures and blow it out of all proportion. Rivalry and controversy gets people talking, and if people are talking they are consuming. It’s simply the oxygen needed to keep some media organisations alive.

The sport itself might frown upon some of the headlines, but it loves the attention. While some might choose to forget when it suits them, column inches are free advertising for governing bodies, and free means more in their coffers.

The most dramatic sporting rivalries take place on the field of play, whether it’s Messi/Ronaldo, Federer/Nadal or Woods/Mickelson.

What built those rivalries wasn’t just the high level of play, as a key component was the protagonists’ differing personalities.

In England, because football is a team game, and the greatest players don’t necessarily come face-to-face too often in 90 minutes, managers become the focal point of the rivalry. They boss over all, become the face of the franchise, and give the most edgy quotes.

There have been some great tabloid battles in the Premiership era, maybe the best being Ferguson/Benitez. Pitting the Scot, who was almost bigger than the game, against the Spaniard, the man of the hardcore fans, was tabloid gold.

Right now, there’s an ache for a Pep/

Jose flare-up. It’s clear that they aren’t the best of friends these days but a tired, beaten Mourinho really can’t be considered a rival to the City man until he can get under his skin on the pitch.

That’s exactly what happened in

Spain, when the two came face to face for four El Clasico games in the space of 18 days in 2011. It proved such an enthralling series of events that Spanish-based, Italian sports writer Paolo Condo wrote a book on it entitled ‘Duellanti’.

And it proved such a success in Italian that it was translated into English by Anthony Wright and released onto the U.K. market as ‘The Duellists’. As a reader, you always wonder if a book loses something when it gets massaged between languages, but here it is.

The four games that it spans are a La Liga clash in the Bernabéu, a Copa Del Rey final in Valencia, and both legs of the Champions League semi-final.

While Barcelona emerged with more to show from the games, ‘The Duellists’ is set as a ‘changing of the guard’ type work as Madrid were closing the gap and bounced back the following season.

The publication contains some very interesting back-and-forth, especially if you weren’t paying particularly close attention to the Spanish football scene in 2011. It delves into what makes both men tick, as Condo seems to have a decent relationship with both and is well respected.

This reviewer has a favoured passage and it’s one that most sports journalists will nod at. Talking about being called into Guardiola’s office and being complimented on a piece he wrote for ‘La Gazzetta’, Condo writes: ‘..it’s always necessary to maintain a balance between being grateful for and suspicious of compliments, a balance that should be in any journalist’s DNA’.

In terms of a sports book, does this have mass appeal like others, outside of the Barcelona/Real Madrid fanbase? Probably not.

As mentioned, it is well put together, it doesn’t out-stay its welcome, it goes through the games in reasonable detail without overburdening the reader, but these two characters are certainly not for everyone.

DEAN GOODISON

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