adminLONDON. — Pep Guardiola has admitted a desire to add Manchester United to his managerial CV, according to revelations in a newly released book chronicling his first season as coach at Bayern Munich.
Guardiola, the former Barcelona coach recruited by Bayern before Sir Alex Ferguson’s retirement as United manager at the end of the 2012-13 season, is under contract at the Allianz Arena until the end of the 2015-16 campaign.
Despite his commitment to the Bundesliga champions, the 43-year-old remains one of the hottest properties in world football who, according to Spanish journalist Martí Perarnau in his book, Pep Confidential: The Inside Story of Pep Guardiola’s First Season at Bayern Munich, was a target for Chelsea, Manchester City and AC Milan before December 2012 when he agreed to accept the challenge of succeeding Jupp Heynckes at Bayern at the end of that season.
Louis van Gaal, the man who appointed Guardiola as Barcelona captain during his time as coach at the Nou Camp, is only three months into a three-year contract to manage United which ends in the summer of 2017.
That makes the prospect of Guardiola moving elsewhere at the end of his three-year deal with Bayern in 2016 more likely than a switch to Old Trafford.
But having given Perarnau open-door access and full co-operation during the year-long project of writing the diary of his first campaign at Bayern, Guardiola’s admission of being seduced by the prospect of managing United is unlikely to go unnoticed by senior figures at Old Trafford, who were frustrated by his unavailability in the wake of David Moyes’s sacking as manager last April.
“From the start, Pep was well disposed to the overtures from the Bavarian club,” Perarnau writes. “A year before, in late July 2011, not long after a resounding 3-1 victory in the Champions League final against Manchester United at Wembley, Barcelona competed in the Audi Cup in Munich.
“Pep liked the set-up at Säbener Strasse (Bayern’s training complex), despite the fact that it was smaller than Barça’s training ground and had fewer technical facilities.
“The Catalan was impressed and told Manel Estiarte [his personal assistant] privately: ‘I like this place. I could see myself coaching here one day’. Pep had said something very similar a few months before, at Manchester United.
“The day after beating Real Madrid in the Champions League semi-final, Guardiola and Estiarte travelled to Manchester to watch their next opponent in action.” — The Telegraph.
Online Reporter