GUARDIOLA FIRES A SALVO
City manager determined to win more titles as team celebrate 10 years of Abu Dhabi ownership
IF there is one word that people at Manchester City use more than any other to describe manager Pep Guardiola, it is ‘intense’. After that comes ‘detailed’ and both are intended as compliments.
“I love my job,” Guardiola said. “I am a Latin guy. I express my feelings, so people know exactly how I feel just by looking at my face.
“It’s easy to understand me. I love my job, I put all of myself into it and I try to do my best. I don’t want to lose.”
Contrary to popular opinion, Guardiola says there is no aesthetic motivation behind the beautiful football for which his teams are famous.
“No, no, I want to win. That phrase, ‘beautiful football’, I don’t use that. Never. So, I want to win but from my experience the best way, and the way I believe brings us closest to winning, is the way we play.
“We want to express ourselves and sometimes when it happens it is attractive for the people that are watching, but to play in that way you need talented players. Without that, it’s not possible to achieve what we achieved. So, we need quality, but what I want is to win.”
It is hard to believe that there is no artistic strand to how Guardiola thinks about the game and he points to the defensive records of his teams as evidence that he doesn’t prize attacking flair over other aspects of the game.
“I’m not romantic or aesthetic. In the period since 2008 or 2009, always our teams were the best defensive team in the league. Just one season we were not. And for that you have to work a lot defensively. But when you talk about beautiful football, you are not talking about this kind of thing.”
Rather than beauty, Guardiola says his philosophy is inspired by what originally sparked his players’ love for the game: the ball.
“The way we want to play with the ball is because I believe that all of the players decided once in their life, when they were kids playing football, that they enjoyed playing with the ball.”
Although the players spent a lot of time with the ball in his first year at City (2016-17), they fell short of expectations, with a third-place finish the pinnacle of the team’s achievements.
“It was the first time I did not win one title in a season and the expectation was so high. We didn’t accomplish our goals and always you reflect. Are we going in the right direction, or do you have to change something? I felt the club, the people here, the staff, all the people who surround me, said, “It’s OK. It’s going to be well”.
“I didn’t feel anything was wrong. We understood it was part of the process. Sometimes you (snaps fingers) get it quicker, sometimes you need more time.”
Guardiola feels there wasn’t a moment when he knew things had turned around. However, he suggests the renewal of the squad had a big impact.
On transfer business, Guardiola relies on two of his closest confidants: CEO Ferran Soriano and football director Txiki Begiristain, both of whom he worked with at Barcelona and who were instrumental in bringing him to City.
He has also developed a close relationship with City chairman Khaldoon Al Mubarak, which both men describe as a genuine friendship.
After a slow start, City enjoyed a record-breaking 2017-18, winning the League Cup and the Premier League and becoming the first team in the history of the competition to reach 100 points in a season.
There are no trophies in his office.
“I’m not a guy who looks at the curriculum vitae, and says, “Oh, how many seasons have I won?” That doesn’t make me happy. I’m not the guy who goes to… I don’t know, the bank… to see how many I have.”
Some of this can be hard to reconcile. One moment, Guardiola says he is driven only by the desire to win. Minutes later, he appears enthralled by the complexities of the game.
Ultimately, what he seems to be saying is that he loves the game, intensely and in detail, and the objective of the game is to win.