The era of the ‘supercoach’ is firmly upon us and from a marketing perspective the Premier League are in dreamland with Guardiola, Mourinho, Conte, Pochettino & Klopp all battling out in the world’s most competitive top flight.
Ahead of a Manchester derby which could ‘decide the title’ there is a very real risk that this could once again become more about the two managers than the fixture itself.
What apparently started as a row over the length of the grass at the Santiago Bernabeu has now escalated into one of football’s greatest rivalries.
And while both parties may not see it as quite the levels of hatred bestowed by journalists and fans alike, neither has done a great deal to tone it down either.
At its height in Spain, where Pep’s Barcelona played Jose’s Real Madrid four times in 18 days in the spring of 2011, things got out of hand.
Arguments over referees, the pitch and lots more beside led to the players from both sides joining in and what followed was unsavoury to say the least.
Guardiola’s vitriolic outburst in a press conference ahead of the sides Champions League semi-final first leg meeting that season won him fans among his players and fans but confirmed that Jose had got to him. There would be no going back for him.
Before his time in Madrid Mourinho was adored by the British press but by the time he returned for a second spell that had changed. The cheeky smile and the glint in his eye had gone, as had the one-liners that made him a hack’s dream.
That, coupled with an extremely ill-advised poke in the eye of man who would subsequently be diagnosed with terminal cancer, would tarnish his reputation forever despite his undoubted success.
Ahead of the first meeting last season, both Pep and Jose played down their past run-ins and mercifully it seemed more about the football. Of course, the contrast in their styles of play and management will always lead to debate but in the past it has been more about them than the game.
Let us hope that ahead of this derby and beyond, their managerial style is where the debate ends, and the actual fixture is the most important factor as it always should be. This game will be going on long after both managers have left for pastures new.
