Could Pep Guardiola's Arrival Spark Revolution in English Football?

Why did Pep Guardiola take the Manchester City job? He says it’s to prove himself; to prove that his success in Spain and Germany was more than just a consequence of circumstance.

England is where managers are made or broken, and Guardiola now sees the Premier League as something of a testing ground.

But what could Guardiola do for the Premier League and English football as a whole? What ripples will be felt from the Catalan’s arrival at the Etihad Stadium? In the grand catalogue of the game’s development in this country, how will his appointment at City register? 

His arrival comes at an interesting time for English football. The game is in need of modernisation, with the Premier League in many respects falling behind the standards set by its European competitors. That has been exposed by the league’s faltering performance in the Champions League, where Spanish and German clubs have dominated in recent years. 

And so Guardiola could be something of a revolutionary figure for the sport in England. He is seen as the vanguard of football’s current coaching elite, with his practices and methods setting a precedent for the best part of a generation. Now the Premier League hopes to draw on that in order to improve and raise itself.

German football is now more technically adept and tactically aware as a result of Guardiola’s tenure at Bayern Munich over the past three years, with the Bundesliga improving due to the Spaniard’s ideologies. It’s not just the Bavarian club who benefited, but those hanging on to their coat-tails as well. 

The Premier League now hopes to benefit in the same way. Guardiola could have the same sort of impact that Arsene Wenger had on the English game back in the late 1990s.

The Frenchman arrived at Arsenal with the country’s national sport in a sorry state. Modernisation was needed, and Wenger brought it. 

Guardiola is charged with sparking the same sort of radical change. His appointment at Manchester City has already forced those across the city at Manchester United to pull up their socks, with Louis van Gaal fired and Jose Mourinho hired. Chelsea have also made an ambitious appointment in an effort to keep pace, with Antonio Conte replacing Guus Hiddink. 

English football has never boasted such an array of coaching talent all at the one time. If the Premier League doesn’t modernise and bring itself up to speed now, it never will. Where Guardiola goes, sporting revolution follows, and the same will surely happen on these shores now that he has pitched up at the Etihad Stadium. 

When Wenger was appointed manager at Arsenal, he altered the entire culture surrounding the club, and subsequently that of the league as a whole. The drinking culture that dogged English football was banished, with a new era of professionalism ushered in upon the Frenchman’s arrival in north London. 

Of course, English football doesn’t need such a revolution this time around, but there is a sense that the sport in the country needs a revolution of intelligence.

Whether it is a symptom of the players or the coaching, English and homegrown players don’t seem to possess the tactical nous and game awareness of their continental counterparts. 

This is an area where Guardiola could have the greatest influence, with the likes of Raheem Sterling and Fabian Delph his guinea pigs at City. 

“Every manager in the world wants to improve their players that is how to improve the team,” said the former Barcelona boss at his unveiling, per Chris Bascombe of the Telegraph. 

“I work like all managers. I have my point of view and how I want to see my team play, but I need time. In the world we don’t have time so we will try to create a good team as soon as possible. Our body language at first is the most important thing and then the rest will come along.”

Indeed, as Guardiola says, the rest will come along. He might not have meant such a phrase in such a way, but it could well be used as a mantra for the role he will inadvertently take on as the vanguard of English football’s new generation of elite managers. 

His influence will be more than just tactical, but there’s no denying that Guardiola will prompt a new tactical age in the Premier League. More focus will be placed on managerial blackboard scribblings than ever before.

“My tactics adapt to the quality of my players,” the City boss continued at his unveiling two weeks ago. “I can’t demand what they can not give me. It is not possible. I can not talk about how my players or how we will play if I do not feel it.

“I want them to be a good team-mate. I like players who think about themselves but also about Manchester City. The reason we are here is to think what we can do to make this a better club. Not what the club can do for them. We want a better club.”

Guardiola has enjoyed success at every club he has taken the reins at so far, winning six league titles and two Champions League trophies over the course of stints at Barcelona and Bayern Munich. He is expected to keep winning at Manchester City, but for English football as a whole, his background and career trajectory up to this point is also of some encouragement.

The peaks in Spanish and German football over the past decade or so can be directly correlated to when Guardiola was a coach in both countries. As Barcelona boss, La Liga was seen as the game’s predominant division, and as Bayern Munich manager, the Bundesliga was billed as the best league in Europe. 

Now the Premier League can look forward to feeling the brush of Guardiola’s golden touch. Manchester City will benefit from the brunt of that touch, but the English game as a whole could shimmer for the arrival of football’s great revolutionary of these times.