{"id":457954,"date":"2026-05-20T07:00:09","date_gmt":"2026-05-20T07:00:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/457954\/"},"modified":"2026-05-20T07:00:09","modified_gmt":"2026-05-20T07:00:09","slug":"so-long-pep-guardiola-nothing-personal-but-you-wont-be-missed-as-city-boss-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/457954\/","title":{"rendered":"So long Pep Guardiola: nothing personal, but you won\u2019t be missed as City boss \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

When news broke on Monday evening about Pep Guardiola<\/a> deciding to end his reign of terror at Manchester City<\/a> come the season\u2019s end, Patrick Vieira, on duty on Sky Sports, expressed his sadness. \u201cI hope it\u2019s not true,\u201d he said, to which most of the audience might have replied: \u201cI hope it bloody is.\u201d <\/p>\n

By then, they were most probably inebriated on champagne. This wouldn\u2019t necessarily have been down to any personal animus towards Guardiola \u2013 it\u2019s just that he wins too much.<\/p>\n

Some of us are old enough to remember the good old days when City were bankrolled by old boy Francis Lee\u2019s toilet roll empire and ended up being flushed down the drain and into the old third division.<\/p>\n

In the previous decade or so, the high point of their achievements, which probably led to an open-top bus parade around Manchester, had been finishing runners-up in the competition that became best known as the Zenith Data Systems Cup. City, by the BBC\u2019s calculations, fielded a team in the final against Chelsea that cost an entire \u20ac500,000, their sole \u201cforeigner\u201d a lad by the name of Mick McCarthy. <\/p>\n

But come 2008, all changed utterly. A hellacious blight was born. The Abu Dhabi crew bought the club, Roberto Mancini and Manuel Pellegrini warmed them up on the trophy-winning front, and then Guardiola arrived. And it\u2019s been a decade of remorseless silverware-greed ever since. <\/p>\n

Yes, spending over \u20ac2 billion on players in that time helped a bit, but that\u2019s still a fair chunk less than Chelsea\u2019s outlay in that decade, and not far ahead of Manchester United\u2019s. But take into account player sales, and City are only fourth in the net-spend list \u2013 behind United, Chelsea and Arsenal. Their combined Premier League haul in that spell? One. Guardiola\u2019s? Six. (Plus a Champions League, three FA Cups and five League Cups.)<\/p>\n

And unlike some of his rivals, he\u2019s generally bought on the decent side. Granted, a handy release clause meant Erling Haaland only cost \u20ac60 million in the summer of 2022, but at the same time United were setting fire to \u20ac95 million when they purchased Antony, while Liverpool were splurging \u20ac75 million on Darwin N\u00fa\u00f1ez. You can decide for yourself which one worked out the best. <\/p>\n

This, of course, is where that 115 figure pops up. That\u2019s the number of charges levelled at City for breaching Premier League financial rules between 2009 and 2018, Guardiola at the helm for the last two of those years, and therefore (alleged) to have benefited from the (alleged) skulduggery that (allegedly) went before. <\/p>\n

\"CityCity manager Pep Guardiola gives instructions to Erling Haaland before sending him on to replace Kevin De Bruyne against Burnley FC in 2024. Photo: Peter Powell\/ EPA-EFE <\/p>\n

If the commission, formed to look into those breaches, ever gets around to producing a verdict \u2013 no rush lads, it\u2019s only been 18-ish months \u2013 then he\u2019ll have, at the very, least, an asterisk or two placed beside his successes.<\/p>\n

But, hard and all as it is to concede, and even if the entire project was (allegedly) illegally financially fuelled, his sides have always been a joy to behold. And his knack for nurturing players and extracting the very best out of them, often in positions entirely unfamiliar to them \u2013 see, for example, John Stones, Matheus Nunes and Nico O\u2019Reilly \u2013 has been proof of his brilliance. <\/p>\n

[\u00a0Pep Guardiola tells Manchester City players he is leaving as club line up Enzo MarescaOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

And under his watch, have there been many greater Premier League players than David Silva, Kevin De Bruyne, Sergio Ag\u00fcero and Bernardo Silva?<\/p>\n

Watching the recent FA youth cup final between Manchester City and Manchester United was, perhaps, a good indication of the legacy he\u2019ll leave behind at the club. Not only were City physically so much taller and beefier than their opponents, there was a marked difference in the humility levels too. <\/p>\n

The City youngsters, largely technically superb, had the look of fellas who felt blessed to be playing for the club, some of the United side had the demeanour of boys who believed their lot were lucky to have them. Petulance FC.<\/p>\n

\"PepPep Guardiola and Nico O’Reilly. Photograph: Adam Davy\/PA Wire <\/p>\n

When substitutions were made, the City players trotted off with no drama, shaking the hands of their replacements and wishing them the best. Some of the United bunch shook their heads in disbelief when withdrawn, moped their way to the sideline in a sulk and barely acknowledged the young fellas taking their place. A small enough thing, maybe, but perhaps telling when it comes to that chat about culture at clubs.<\/p>\n

Twice, full-back Jo\u00e3o Cancelo was named in the Premier League team of the year, he was outstanding. But in the summer of 2024, Guardiola waved him off, much to everyone\u2019s surprise. Attitude \u201cissues\u201d were suggested, which were later as good as confirmed. Times have, indeed, changed since the days of, say, Alex Ferguson, but Guardiola\u2019s adherence to that notion that no player is bigger than the club have served him, and City, well. <\/p>\n

All City\u2019s detractors can hope is that the succession stakes at City will prove as, well, successful as those at United after Ferguson hung up his hairdryer. That Enzo Maresca will be the new David Moyes (or Louis van Gaal, Ole Gunnar Solskj\u00e6r, Ralf Rangnick, Erik ten Hag, Ruben Amorim or Michael Carrick).<\/p>\n

\"PepPep Guardiola has a knack for nurturing players and extracting the very best out of them. Photograph: Martin Rickett\/PA Wire <\/p>\n

And that the best they can hope for in the years ahead is something akin to the runners-up spot in the Zenith Data Systems Cup. Doubtful, though. The Pep man has seen to that with his decade\u2019s work.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When news broke on Monday evening about Pep Guardiola deciding to end his reign of terror at Manchester…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":457955,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[61,60,8579,16909,1102,112],"class_list":["post-457954","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-manchester-city","tag-pep-guardiola","tag-premier-league","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/457954","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=457954"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/457954\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/457955"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=457954"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=457954"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=457954"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}