The reality is we didn’t know before the January 2024 transfer window that la liga were going to give Madrid a holiday, and Pep is clear that he wants to work with a small squad and the success he gets is to a large extent down to this. The number of people who cherry pick either the odd time something goes wrong, or using hindsight that the rest of us mortals don’t have, is shit. A prime example is the CL final v Chelsea that 5 years later people are still carping on about, had we won nothing would have been said. Of course Pep isn’t perfect but I wouldn’t class myself as capable of outperforming him. Anyway allow me to cherry pick -
Premier league 2018
League Cup 2018
Premier League 2019
F A Cup 2019
League Cup 2019
League Cup 2020
League Cup 2021
Premier League 2021
Premier League 2022
Premier League 2023
F A Cup 2023
Champions League 2023
Super Cup 2023
Club World Cup 2023
Premier League 2024
I’ll skip the charity shields, only a major trophy if the rags win it.
On top of that beautiful entertaining football and what a decent bloke he is too.
And yet people still cherry pick away at things they deem failures, like Chelsea in the CL. It’s the genius of the man that we won so much, and frankly all people can say with hindsight is he fucked up in Porto, we got loads of injuries - who is to say that if he’d had a bigger squad team morale wouldn’t have suffered and we’d have won a lot less?
I judge the man based on what he’s achieved, not what he could have achieved. He has done it his way and it’s been unbelievable; obviously not perfect as some people seem to expect.
PS the only people who don’t make mistakes are the ones who do fuck all, or the ones who judge based on the perfect knowledge of hindsight