Is Pep the greatest manager of all time?

He is the modern day SAF, on steroids. SAF operated in a different era, apart from Wenger he did not really have that much of a competition, no one else was close to his level. And we were far more dominant financially as well. Jose came to the league towards the end of course.

Pep has had Klopp, Ten Hag, Tuchel, Poch, De Zerbi just to name a few. And he is operating in an era where it is more competitive, the players are fitter, more skilful, the skill gap between players in different clubs is smaller, tactical scrutiny is high with all the online analysis/media etc.

Wtf?? :lol::lol: Jose was at the peak of his powers with unlimited budget. Also, Pep against Poch, De Zerbi?

Ok, enough internet for today.
 
Pep is definitely the best manager of this era and has a very strong argument to be right up there in the all time lists.
 
Best coach in my lifetime, annoyingly.

As for the manager, that’s a different story altogether. The game has changed, so the comparison is difficult.

What he does post-City will determine that. I’m not saying that he needs to go down and manage Port Vale, but his success is intrinsically related to where he has managed and the wealth and domination those clubs have had.

He’s brilliant, though. Undeniably brilliant.
 
Best coach of his generation, probably. Nothing more than that. There are absolute giants in the history of football, both coaches and managers. Guardiola may join them eventually, but that will be after he has retired from football coaching.
 
I don't remember saying they were shit. I said Guardiola developed them into becoming such elite players.

"very boring rant" definitely more interesting than convincing yourself Pep only won because he had great players with him, and he wouldn't be able to win the league managing Leeds United.

Managers develop players.. Get over it.
Not even a fool would think that. Indeed, they weren’t shite, but already great players.
 
It is not the victories that make him great, it is the way he coaches. And transforms average players into much better players, again and again. His understanding of when to let players go (Sane, Cancelo etc) when others would not.

The way he challenges himself every season to do it differently, changing formations etc - I mean Stones in midfield WTF? I used to recall how bad he was, at centre half. No one talks about that now.

He is the modern day SAF, on steroids. SAF operated in a different era, apart from Wenger he did not really have that much of a competition, no one else was close to his level. And we were far more dominant financially as well. Jose came to the league towards the end of course.

Pep has had Klopp, Ten Hag, Tuchel, Poch, De Zerbi just to name a few. And he is operating in an era where it is more competitive, the players are fitter, more skilful, the skill gap between players in different clubs is smaller, tactical scrutiny is high with all the online analysis/media etc.


As unpalatable as that sounds, I think he is the greatest. Just.

So you don't mention Jose as a competitor because he came to the league towards the end? Even though he arrived in 2004 and was heavily backed by Roman. Winning 2 Premier League titles in a row amassing 90+ points and I think everyone back then thought they'd never be pipped to a league title. Especially after they signed Ballack and Shevchenko in 2006. He was the only manager then to break the stranglehold by SAF and Wenger. But yeah that's not competition.

De Zerbi and Poch are insane competitors to Pep? Pochettino who's never ever competed for a league title in the Prem, failed miserably with PSG and pretty much has won nothing in career compared to Jose. And I have to assume the De Zerbi mention is a joke. I mean :lol::lol::lol:
 
Having a philosophy that revolutionized football at that time does connect with two of those team, as they emulated that philosophy to be successful. Similar to what we are seeing with Brighton and Di Zerbi. I am sure that his philosophy will have an impact for other teams trying to be successful in the premier league in the near future. Some people just forgot how Southampton and the spurs side changed English football.

I've been going back and forth on whether you're a troll or not but this obviously broke the scale.
 
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He is the modern day SAF, on steroids. SAF operated in a different era, apart from Wenger he did not really have that much of a competition, no one else was close to his level. And we were far more dominant financially as well. Jose came to the league towards the end of course.

Pep has had Klopp, Ten Hag, Tuchel, Poch, De Zerbi just to name a few. And he is operating in an era where it is more competitive, the players are fitter, more skilful, the skill gap between players in different clubs is smaller, tactical scrutiny is high with all the online analysis/media etc.

This is just mental :lol:

Pep has never had to compete against the same calibre teams of Arsene's early Arsenal teams or José's Chelsea teams. The closest is probably Klopp' s peak Liverpool and they actually beat City to the title.

On a European level SAF had to deal with Italian teams when they were powerhouses plus Bayern and the 2 Spanish giants. Now it's only really Real and Bayern in their way.

These opinions are frankly quite wild and I can only guess it's because you have only starting watching football since 2010.
 
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Isnt the question, can a manager perform above expectations? Guardiola did briliantly to clear out the dead wood and fine tune the team at Barca and had them playing the way they did. However he ran away when Mourinho pipped him to the league in 2012. He is obviously a brilliant manager, but I just dont think there is something amazing about winning his 3rd CL after a decade of playing FM on cheat mode. If SAF had played FM on cheat mode he would have destroyed everything. I honestly dont believe Guardiola could rebuild a club with limited funds. He is a brilliant luxury manager and riddled with cheating both as a player and as a manager.

https://www.planetfootball.com/quic...0-total-transfer-fee-signings-most-expensive/
 
I think he's the goat personally and even before the treble. He did enough for me to achieve goat status in my books same as Messi before winning the WC was up there with Pele and Maradona before the WC.

It will be hard to see him as not being the best ever when he retires after all is said and done.

Fergie is his only competition which he has an argument for surpassing already.
 
This is just mental :lol:

Pep has never had to compete against the same calibre teams of Arsene's early Arsenal teams or José's Chelsea teams. The closest is probably Klopp' s peak Liverpool and they actually beat City to the title.

On a European level SAF had to deal with Italian teams when they were powerhouses plus Bayern and the 2 Spanish giants. Now it's only really Real and Bayern in their way.

These opinions are frankly quite wild and I can only guess it's because you have only starting watching football since 2010.

Klopp took Liverpool twice to a mental amount points in the PL, some of the highest tally´s ever and back to back CL finals while working with a budget. Pep has taken City to mental amounts of points and a CL now while working without a budget and highly likely money under the table. I honestly dont believe Pep can do the jobs Saf did and Klopp did at Dortmund and Liverpool, but he is still a brilliant manager no doubt.
 
Was Andres Iniesta considered world class when Pep took over in 2008?

Depends on who you ask, but he certainly wasnt considered one of the best midfielders ever at the time, but he´d already been good in Spains 2008 euro win.
 
Klopp took Liverpool twice to a mental amount points in the PL, some of the highest tally´s ever and back to back CL finals while working with a budget. Pep has taken City to mental amounts of points and a CL now while working without a budget and highly likely money under the table. I honestly dont believe Pep can do the jobs Saf did and Klopp did at Dortmund and Liverpool, but he is still a brilliant manager no doubt.
Oh I definitely agree about this, I was actaully discussing this exact same thing with a friend a few months ago and we both agreed that Klopp peak team surpasses Pep's in terms budget and context. This is why I mentioned them in my original post you quoted, it's the only real competition Pep has had in the league. It's just laughable to say this is more than what SAF experienced.
 
Isnt the question, can a manager perform above expectations? Guardiola did briliantly to clear out the dead wood and fine tune the team at Barca and had them playing the way they did. However he ran away when Mourinho pipped him to the league in 2012. He is obviously a brilliant manager, but I just dont think there is something amazing about winning his 3rd CL after a decade of playing FM on cheat mode. If SAF had played FM on cheat mode he would have destroyed everything. I honestly dont believe Guardiola could rebuild a club with limited funds. He is a brilliant luxury manager and riddled with cheating both as a player and as a manager.

https://www.planetfootball.com/quic...0-total-transfer-fee-signings-most-expensive/
Shock horror Pep is a check book manager. Spending so much in much less years than the other top spending managers.

But Mourinho‘s United spending. My god, how can we still have some folks on the Caf claiming how he wasn’t backed.
 
Isnt the question, can a manager perform above expectations? Guardiola did briliantly to clear out the dead wood and fine tune the team at Barca and had them playing the way they did. However he ran away when Mourinho pipped him to the league in 2012. He is obviously a brilliant manager, but I just dont think there is something amazing about winning his 3rd CL after a decade of playing FM on cheat mode. If SAF had played FM on cheat mode he would have destroyed everything. I honestly dont believe Guardiola could rebuild a club with limited funds. He is a brilliant luxury manager and riddled with cheating both as a player and as a manager.
What kind of an argument is this though? If SAF spent as Guardiola has done during the past 7 years, then yes, he would have destroyed everything. Why? Because no other team was even close to spending that kind of money during his time. These days there are quite a few clubs that spends in the proximity of what City does, so it's not really the same. Just this season, a team in England spent 600m on transfers. That's about as much as City has spent during the past 4 seasons. No one would be able to dominate these days without spending huge.
 
Shock horror Pep is a check book manager. Spending so much in much less years than the other top spending managers.

But Mourinho‘s United spending. My god, how can we still have some folks on the Caf claiming how he wasn’t backed.

Yeah that is mental. It was mainly not spending on Maguire under his tenure that led to this sentiment.
 
What kind of an argument is this though? If SAF spent as Guardiola has done during the past 7 years, then yes, he would have destroyed everything. Why? Because no other team was even close to spending that kind of money during his time. These days there are quite a few clubs that spends in the proximity of what City does, so it's not really the same. Just this season, a team in England spent 600m on transfers. That's about as much as City has spent during the past 4 seasons. No one would be able to dominate these days without spending huge.

Well there are multiple issues with comparing Man City’s spending with other clubs.

They allegedly spent a lot off the books, as evidenced by the investigations by the UEFA and the PL. So you can’t compare City’s spending and other clubs on a like for like basis. Their source of revenue is also not always clear, with Abu Dhabi’s sponsorships, commercial revenue from non-existant companies and so on.
Money isn’t everything but it played a huge part that shouldn’t be brushed aside.

But then yes, they are well run on the sporting side. Guardiola is also a great coach. I hate the guy but he’s a great coach, there’s no denying it.
However, all of Guardiola’s tenure are being tainted by some sort of money scandal. I’m not sure the public opinion will remember it but football fans certainly will
 
What kind of an argument is this though? If SAF spent as Guardiola has done during the past 7 years, then yes, he would have destroyed everything. Why? Because no other team was even close to spending that kind of money during his time. These days there are quite a few clubs that spends in the proximity of what City does, so it's not really the same. Just this season, a team in England spent 600m on transfers. That's about as much as City has spent during the past 4 seasons. No one would be able to dominate these days without spending huge.

You dont remember Mourinho at Chelsea in his first stint there? Adjusting for inflation that was mental money. Fergie also saw off big spending City in reclaiming the title in 2013. Both City and Chelsea were huge spenders during parts of Fergie´s tenure at Man Utd. Real Madrid spent huge sums of money during Fergies time especially went they went all out for Ronaldo, Kaka, Benzema and Alonso in 1 window and the following seasons. Madrid were also famous for breaking world records from their previous Galatico period.
 
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The Pep/City fanboys on here are insufferable. Some of you are United fans too. Have some fecking shame.
 
The time for this discussion is when he retires. Unless he stays at City for 15 more years winning 15 more PL titles and a few CL on top.
 
You dont remember Mourinho at Chelsea? Adjusting for inflation that was mental money. Fergie also saw off big spending City in reclaiming the title in 2013. Both City and Chelsea were huge spenders during parts of Fergie´s tenure at Man Utd. Real Madrid spent huge sums ofl money during Fergies time especially went they went all out for Ronaldo, Kaka, Benzema and Alonso in 1 window and the following seasons.
Yeah, I know Chelsea spent huge the first couple of seasons after Abramovic took over. They needed to get a team that could compete with Arsenal and United. Their spending sort of fizzled out after a few seasons though. City also tooks quite a few years of spending huge in order to even be able to compete, and their spending obviously has been sustained for 15 or so years now. Real obviously spent big around the first Galactico era and then again starting from the Ronaldo-summer and another five seasons after that.

But look at the last season in England:
You have Newcastle almost spending 180m, Arsenal 180m, Chelsea 600m, United 240m, Tottenham 180m and then City on that. Disregarding Chelsea's season, which clearly is out of the norm, spending around 150-200m is pretty standard these days.

Then we obvously have Barcelona and Real that every now and then pulls off huge windows as well. Juventus also regularly buys for 150-200m, PSG obviously has insane financial power and can offer their players 300m just to stay at the club.
 
Depends on who you ask, but he certainly wasnt considered one of the best midfielders ever at the time, but he´d already been good in Spains 2008 euro win.

But thats the point, Iniesta was good before Pep, after Pep arrived he became world class and turned into one of the best of all time. People are using revisionism to undermine Pep.
 
Yeah, I know Chelsea spent huge the first couple of seasons after Abramovic took over. They needed to get a team that could compete with Arsenal and United. Their spending sort of fizzled out after a few seasons though. City also tooks quite a few years of spending huge in order to even be able to compete, and their spending obviously has been sustained for 15 or so years now. Real obviously spent big around the first Galactico era and then again starting from the Ronaldo-summer and another five seasons after that.

But look at the last season in England:
You have Newcastle almost spending 180m, Arsenal 180m, Chelsea 600m, United 240m, Tottenham 180m and then City on that. Disregarding Chelsea's season, which clearly is out of the norm, spending around 150-200m is pretty standard these days.

Then we obvously have Barcelona and Real that every now and then pulls off huge windows as well. Juventus also regularly buys for 150-200m, PSG obviously has insane financial power and can offer their players 300m just to stay at the club.

Yeah but thats because there has never been more money in the game and the transfer fee´s are inflated. But yeah City is a bit unique in being backed over such a long time. Roman is the most obvious comparison, but he did seem keen on getting the club to to run on its own finances at some point. He did put in 2B though during his entire ownership. How much that is adjusting for inflation I dont know. According to Kieran Maguire, He spent 692 mil pounds in his first transfer window at Chelsea when adjusted for inflation.


https://twitter.com/KieranMaguire
 
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Yeah but thats because there has never been more money in the game and the transfer fee´s are inflated. But yeah City is a bit unique in being backed over such a long time. Roman is the most obvious comparison, but he did seem keen on getting the club to to run on its own finances at some point. He did put in 2B though during his entire ownership. How much that is adjusting for inflation I dont know. According to Kieran Maguire, He spent 692 mil punds in his transfer window at Chelsea when adjusted for inflation.


https://twitter.com/KieranMaguire


Insane how much Chelsea spent back then. For Ferguson to successfully topple a team with an unlimited buget was definitely impressive. As you point out, even Guardiola didn't spend that much, relative to competition.
 
Yeah but thats because there has never been more money in the game and the transfer fee´s are inflated. But yeah City is a bit unique in being backed over such a long time. Roman is the most obvious comparison, but he did seem keen on getting the club to to run on its own finances at some point. He did put in 2B though during his entire ownership. How much that is adjusting for inflation I dont know. According to Kieran Maguire, He spent 692 mil punds in his transfer window at Chelsea when adjusted for inflation.
I'd take those numbers with a grain of salt, but Chelsea's early Abramovich definitely stands out.

I'd say Chelsea's 2-3 first years after Abramovich and City's first 3-4 years after their takeover are the periods in English football where one team really is far and away apart from the rest of the teams in terms of spending. The last 10 years have been much more even, with a lot more clubs being able to pay huge transfer fees for players and buying a lot of players as well. Even during Pep's first two years in City, where his spending was at the biggest, it still was much much much closer to what United and Chelsea spent during that time than during the two above mentioned few years.
 
I'd take those numbers with a grain of salt, but Chelsea's early Abramovich definitely stands out.

I'd say Chelsea's 2-3 first years after Abramovich and City's first 3-4 years after their takeover are the periods in English football where one team really is far and away apart from the rest of the teams in terms of spending. The last 10 years have been much more even, with a lot more clubs being able to pay huge transfer fees for players and buying a lot of players as well. Even during Pep's first two years in City, where his spending was at the biggest, it still was much much much closer to what United and Chelsea spent during that time than during the two above mentioned few years.

Yeah but my point is still that Fergie saw off oil backed clubs during his tenure at United. And they were spending like big oils clubs do today. Its true when you have your desired squad you dont need to spend that much, just tweak it a bit untill the next cycle, but Roman´s Chelsea were really taking the piss and nabbbing up players that United were said to be interested in.
 
But thats the point, Iniesta was good before Pep, after Pep arrived he became world class and turned into one of the best of all time. People are using revisionism to undermine Pep.

Yeah same applies to Xavi. Who Barcelona was looking to sell to us(Man Utd) before Pep was appointed assured Xavi would have a key place in his team.
 
The Pep/City fanboys on here are insufferable. Some of you are United fans too. Have some fecking shame.

This. A ban hammer for the summer would do wonders.

SAF managed here and some are still saying yes to Pep. Crazy.
 
Yeah but my point is still that Fergie saw off oil backed clubs during his tenure at United. And they were spending like big oils clubs do today. Its true when you have your desired squad you dont need to spend that much, just tweak it a bit untill the next cycle, but Roman´s Chelsea were really taking the piss and nabbbing up players that United were said to be interested in.
He did, and did so incredibly well. No doubt about that. And we can agree if he got the kind of money Chelsea got in the early 00's he'd have won even more.
 
He did, and did so incredibly well. No doubt about that. And we can agree if he got the kind of money Chelsea got in the early 00's he'd have won even more.

Like Rio remarked during LVG´s spending spree "If we had spent like that under Fergie we would have won at least 2 or 3 more CL´s". Maybe not entirely true, but we get the point. Whether Fergie was restricted or it was Fergies own philosophy of the game I dont know, but I grew up with Man Utd being the richest club in the world but we would very rarely spend like we were the richest club in the world + our salary cap. We missed out on so many great players because we didnt spend like we were the richest. Yet Fergie kept us up there. But I do believe we would be the kings of football if we did spend like Chelsea, Man City and Real Madrid.

Of course our spending post Fergie just shows how horrible our management has been and getting yes, value for money.
 
He world class but would still like him to try and take a risk and do what fergue did at united from ground up or what mourinho did at Porto