Premier League at war
Hfurious Guardiola hits back after FFP criticism from rivals hcity manager wants apology and end to ‘whispering’ taunts
Manchester City were at war with their Premier League rivals over their scrapped European ban last night as a fiery Pep Guardiola hit back at fierce criticism from Jose Mourinho and Jurgen Klopp and demanded an apology over the club’s treatment.
Barely 24 hours after the Court of Arbitration for Sport’s decision to quash City’s two-season European suspension for alleged breaches of Uefa’s financial fair play rules, English football found itself at the centre of escalating tensions among its elite clubs.
Mourinho, the Tottenham Hotspur head coach, branded the ruling a “disgrace” and claimed FFP was finished and the “circus” doors open. Klopp, his Liverpool counterpart, said the appeal verdict was “not a good day for football”.
But, in one of his most pugnacious, emotional addresses as City manager, Guardiola came out swinging, calling for an end to the “whispering” campaign against his club and demanding an apology from those who had characterised them as “cheats” and “liars”.
Insisting the judgment ended the debate over whether City’s litany of titles were tarnished, Guardiola also took aim at the eight top-flight teams – Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Arsenal, Tottenham, Leicester, Wolves and Burnley – who had written a joint-letter to Cas opposing the prospect of City applying to freeze a ban prior to last month’s hearing.
Javier Tebas, the outspoken president of La Liga who had claimed Cas was “not up to standard” after struggling to contain his fury at the verdict, was also subjected to a blistering attack by Guardiola.
“All of them have their opinions – Jurgen and Jose – but I tell Jose and Jurgen that today was a good day for football. A very good day. It was clear what happened, and that’s nice,” the City manager
The word beforehand was that Pep Guardiola was spoiling for a fight. But, even then, few could have imagined the Manchester City manager would unload on the club’s long line of critics and dissenters in quite this fashion. He had probably just caught wind of some incendiary comments from Jose Mourinho and Jurgen Klopp shortly before he took to his seat at 1.30pm yesterday but, in reality, Guardiola needed no encouragement, no prompt to unburden himself of what must have felt like years of pent-up frustration.
In a strange way, a press conference via Zoom actually provided an unusual degree of proximity and you only needed to look into the whites of the eyes of a man as animated as he can often be on the touchline to recognise that this was an address that was months, not minutes, in the making.
As press conference theatre goes, it was up there with Rafael Benitez’s “facts” discourse at Liverpool and Jose Mourinho’s “heritage” tirade as Manchester United manager.
A rant? Of sorts, yes. Guardiola was unfailingly polite, even a little humorous, and his 25 minutes in front of that computer screen were underpinned by an unbridled happiness that City’s two-year European ban had been overturned.
But he was also angry, defiant and patently unafraid to upset rivals – domestic and European – or the establishment figures whom he accused of waging a “whispering” campaign against his club.
And it was most definitely “his club”.
Any City supporter who watched Guardiola nail his colours to City’s mast will be a little more confident of their manager hanging around beyond next summer now.
And his players might have witnessed this performance and felt it carried the same motivational powers as Barcelona’s squad did when they watched Guardiola’s stirring “puto amo” (“f------ boss”) address to Mourinho in 2011.
Ever since the German magazine Der Spiegel first published a series of damaging allegations about City’s finances as part of the Football Leaks cache last year, Guardiola has been forced to bite his lip.
He has bristled, simmered and occasionally shown signs of being ready to boil over as the questioning tested his patience, but finally the gloves were off.
And he was not going to take any prisoners. To those who had accused City of “cheating” and “lying”, he demanded an apology.
The eight clubs – and he named them, Manchester United, Liverpool, Chelsea, Arsenal, Tottenham, Leicester, Wolves and Burnley – who had written a joint letter to the Court of Arbitration for Sport opposing the prospect of City applying to freeze a ban prior to last month’s hearing were told to at least have the courage to air their grievances directly to City in the future.
“I understand they want the five positions for the Champions League,” said Guardiola, at the same time doubtless jumping with delight inside that United, Chelsea, Leicester and Wolves will now just have to thrash it out for the two remaining spots in the top four.
Klopp’s claim that the Cas ruling was “not a good day for football” and Mourinho’s insistence that the decision was a “disgrace” were dismissed.
“I tell Jose and Jurgen that today was a good day for football. A very good day,” Guardiola hit back.
Even Arsene Wenger, the former Arsenal manager who has spoken out repeatedly in the past about “financial doping”, was not spared.
“So we have money but the other clubs have money, too,” Guardiola went on. “We spend in the last decade more than it was in the past, yes, but 20, 25, 30 years ago Arsene Wenger – the guy who defends perfectly financial fair play – so Arsene, you know that Manchester City was correct with what we have done.”
But perhaps the best put-down of the lot was reserved for Javier Tebas, president of La Liga in Guardiola’s homeland, Spain.
Tebas – a long-standing critic of City – had claimed Cas was “not up to standard” after reacting angrily to the ruling and it felt like Guardiola had waited a long time to vent his feelings about a man who he clearly believes would be better off tending to his own troubled garden. “He’s another one, this guy,” Guardiola began, witheringly.
“Senor Tebas must be so jealous of the Premier League and English football. He’s an incredible legal expert, from what I see.
“So next time maybe we’re going to ask them which court judges we will have to go to. He has to be a little bit worried and concerned about La Liga and focus on them.
“But normally these kind of people, when the sentence is good for him it’s perfect – like what happens many times in Spain now – but when the sentence is against, the problem is for others.
“Yeah, we’ll be in the Champions League next season, Senor Tebas, because what we did, we did it properly.” Ouch.
Guardiola is a man who tends to let his teams do the talking. But not yesterday.
He had waited a long time for yesterday. And he was never going to pass up the opportunity to get things off his chest.
‘I tell Jose and Jurgen that today was a good day for football. A very good day’