Burnwinter wrote:
jones wrote:
Nobody claimed the exact thing that Quincy said but I get his point, people like to point at the players at his disposal to take away from his own achievements. Before he took over it was only United in all of Europe who fluked themselves to a treble, having great players in your squad doesn't mean shit really if you can't translate it to the pitch. Barcelona are probably the most dominant club side in the world since Ajax in the 70s and a large part if not most of that is down to the changes Guardiola initiated.
To swing it back the other way, he had a unique level of authority at Barcelona due to his connection to the club both as a player and manager, and when he went to Bayern they really had just won everything under Heynckes.
I think you've misunderstood me. I'm not saying he's guaranteed to be a success in England, I was merely pointing out the inconsistency of the criticism aimed at him à la "my nan would've won the treble with Barcelona 08/09 too"; it's a monumental job and we're still seeing the aftereffects of his work there. Sure Xavi and Iniesta were there before him but they weren't nearly as important or good in the decade or so they were playing there before him.
Guardiola's English adventure is going to be a hell of a gamble compared to anything else he's done. He's had a record of personality conflicts at Barcelona and Bayern and of scrapping players out of whom other managers might have squeezed more value. Abu Dhabi would like to fund him heavily to replace the likes of Touré and back up the semi-crocked Agüero, but City still have limits to their revenue and FFP is still in force.
With Guardiola in charge I wouldn't be surprised if City limped into the Champions League places with Silva frozen out for "not trying hard enough in training" or similar—and he might well tear Arsenal's current squad apart purging us of our two or three nearly men.
Haven't paid a lot of attention to the farce UEFA likes to call FFP but if memory serves it has been drastically loosened.
I agree that City will be a harder job than Bayern, not necessarily though than Barcelona for him, there's always loads of bullshit politics (literally) involved in that club. The only real issue he'll be facing is the quality of the league and most here seem to think that Pellegrini is massively underachieving; even if the EPL has stronger competition than the Bundesliga I don't think it's too unrealistic to expect Guardiola to get more out of the players already there and win the title even in his first season.
And finally with regards to Arsenal: those "personality conflicts" would be a fucking breath of fresh air in a club where everyone seems to be in league with each other and nobody threatens another's position regardless of how underperforming they are. A bit of public pressure to get things moving instead of sugarcoating every word surely seems like a better idea than our next manager being best buddies with egghead and mustache again.
