Online Reporter
LONG after Pep Guardiola has gone, his impact on English football will still be felt.
Arriving in the Premier League ten years ago as one of the great minds in the game’s history, his style was derided even if his achievements at Barcelona and Bayern Munich were not.
Could he do it on a wet Tuesday night in Stoke, was the question.
Is a man who had fallen short in Europe with a Bayern mega-team really suitable for ‘Our League’?
Does Pep just rely on having the biggest access to club bank balances and the best players?
How would his Tiki-Taka possession plan work against the physicality in this country?
As it turns out, pretty well.
He will depart Manchester City as a six-time Prem winner – at least.
That could still become seven depending on what happens in the final week of the season.
Either way, his legacy will hardly be dented if Arsenal do take what has so often been Pep’s crown.
Guardiola – labelled a bald fraud and a serial overthinker – has picked up 15 major trophies in his time at the Etihad.
There are three Community Shields, a Club World Cup, and a Uefa Super Cup to pad out his collection.
But it has never been just about the silverware with Pep. He is one of the sport’s most lovingly confusing characters – so pent up with energy he can ramble on to a room without making much sense but engrossing it nonetheless.
His success goes beyond just the many wins. It is embedded into the very foundation of the game in England now.
Crawley will play from the back, splitting centre-halves and actively look to exploit overloads in all phases. Goalkeepers will pass into danger rather than play safe.
The best way to be a midfielder is to start as a full-back. Kids are growing up with these roles more defined than ever. The level of tactical complexity has soared.
It feels as though English football as a whole thinks about the game more than ever – so much so that Pep was considered and reportedly offered the national team job.
And yes, going hairless without a beard is still a big fashion statement.
So what are the five biggest ways Guardiola has fundamentally altered the landscape of English football, and how will it hold up over time?
The death of Brexitball and birth of Tiki-Taka
Guardiola actually doesn’t like the phrase Tiki-Taka because it implies possession for the sake of possession – something he hates and doesn’t like to be associated with. Everything has a purpose.
Instead, he has been focused on control. Force opponents deep with “a thousand, million passes,” and penning them in.
The counter- press suffocates – attack, or possession, as the best form of defence – and then relentless overloads are exploited.
Guardiola’s form of Juego de Posicion (JdP, positional play) was a world away from hoofing long balls in a 4-4-2.
None of the Sam Allardyce “good old- fashioned” physical brutality with massive bruisers up front, lumping it long to the big man, winning knockdowns to the little man, and going from there.
Pep’s methodical football changed how most view the game.
Although the past few years and a reversion to set pieces, long throws, and even a Tony Pulis-like four centre-backs starting – with two at full-back – have not stopped Pep’s ultimate aims.
You will see children playing possession ball, rondos and taking more risks than ever to try and emulate the style that led Pep to total dominance.
Redefining player roles
It is long forgotten now, but in an age of wingers cutting in and firing it into the top corner – Franck Ribéry and Arjen Robben at his lethal Bayern Munich side – Pep reverted to out-and-out wide men.
The left footed Leroy Sane played on the left and Raheem Sterling was on the right.
Pep used cut-backs and back-post crosses to exploit gaps in-behind a defence, going against the grain.
When struggling in 2022, he moved Joao Cancelo into midfield to find a new way of building in possession to his preferred 3-2-5 shape.
Before long, Rico Lewis was maybe the first specialist player in this hybrid position.
It has been a much more popular thing ever since. Even John Stones was deployed as a No10 at times.
Before Pep, it is hard to imagine anything like this happening as regularly across the game from Prem competitors to grassroots.
Evolving the goalkeeper
Joe Hart was probably City’s best-ever goalkeeper before Pep came along.
He dropped him immediately in favour of a ball-playing specialist.
Now, the arrival of Claudio Bravo hardly worked, but it signalled the shift to having players comfortable in possession across the field.
The demand for passing and possession mastery went beyond what many saw as the usually desired skillset for most positions.
Again, this season – with Erling Haaland at one end and Gianluigi Donnarumma at the other – is a bit of an outlier, but also evidence of his further adaption.
But at the start, Pep’s use of goalies, not as a defensive tool or final barrier, was radical.
Excellent shot-stopper Hart was binned – and never really recovered.
And that was just the first of his many ploys.
Ederson took things to a new level with claims that he could actually have been used in midfield or was the team’s best penalty- taker.
He became established as the new norm of GKs after Pep changed the way they were seen – Sun.
