Champions League with Pep

pee dubya said:
Should have beaten Chelsea in the final, definitely.

But apart from that, you're competing against the best of the best and there's enough randomness and luck involved that it becomes extremely difficult to win it repeatedly.
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PSG are lucky in that English and Spanish teams are in a fallow period.

Just good timing isn’t it.
 
Small margins and daft decisions probably played their part. At the same time, had we narrowed our focus to the League and Champions League, we might have won a couple more, yet Guardiola would then have left having put far, far fewer trophies in the cabinet.

In some respects, given where we’d been and come from, it was arguably more important to have a manager who could establish sustained domestic dominance. Much like Shankly at Liverpool in the 1960s-70s, we needed someone to instil in us, both club and fans alike, a serial winning mentality. If we go on to enjoy similar levels of success in the coming years, it will be Guardiola’s greatest legacy.
 
It's just one reason I didn't want Arsenal to win, being handed a knockout run that involved Sporting, Leverkusen and Athletico was just too soft. If they won that it'd just be too soft. You need to beat a City, Madrid, Barcelona, Munich, Inter, Juve, Milan, even Liverpool or United, on the way. Some of those teams aren't great ATM, but putting them out still means something. Winning a Champions League without it would have been too soft.
 
I think we should have won more. It's harder for EPL teams to win vs Bayern, PSG, Real and Barca as they have several advantages over teams in our league, so I don't think we should have won several more, but as least one more.

No team has won the league cup and champs league in the same season, and I would like to see the next manager play youth and heavily rotate in the league cup next year, to keep us fresh for the bigger trophies.
 
We've clearly underachieved in the competition. One CL in the 10 years under Pep is underwhelming, given the quality of the sides we've had. We should have beaten an average Chelsea side in 2021. One of Pep's legendary brainfarts cost us that night. And, in my opinion, the Centurions team were good enough to win the competition in that period. We were screwed by the referee when we played the dips that season. And, like many on here, that defeat to Lyon still haunts me. That Sterling miss will forevr be etched in my memory.
 
Greenandblue said:
It's just one reason I didn't want Arsenal to win, being handed a knockout run that involved Sporting, Leverkusen and Athletico was just too soft. If they won that it'd just be too soft. You need to beat a City, Madrid, Barcelona, Munich, Inter, Juve, Milan, even Liverpool or United, on the way. Some of those teams aren't great ATM, but putting them out still means something. Winning a Champions League without it would have been too soft.
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Does this apply to the FA Cup, too? In all fairness, we've enjoyed a couple of "Arsenal-like" cruises in that tournament recently. ;-)

Think UEFA will tinker with the draw format in the coming years. It's unhealthy, from sporting and commercial perspectives, to have such imbalanced sides.
 
Too much messing about with formations that cost us games..
Too many matches against Real Madrid.
 
Gabriel said:
Small margins and daft decisions probably played their part. At the same time, had we narrowed our focus to the League and Champions League, we might have won a couple more, yet Guardiola would then have left having put far, far fewer trophies in the cabinet.

In some respects, given where we’d been and come from, it was arguably more important to have a manager who could establish sustained domestic dominance. Much like Shankly at Liverpool in the 1960s-70s, we needed someone to instil in us, both club and fans alike, a serial winning mentality. If we go on to enjoy similar levels of success in the coming years, it will be Guardiola’s greatest legacy.
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It's never stated also that we were playing in the CL at the same time as one of the best European team in history Real Madrid. I don't mean they were the best team to watch, they were just the best team in the CL because they knew how to win it. They were never the better team against us but they still usually found a way past us.

Take Real Madrid out and I say we win at least 1-2 more champions leagues. They were just extremely difficult to beat over 2 legs and except for the treble year we were never able to figure them out.

It's similar with Liverpool in the league, take Liverpool out and Pep wins 9 titles in 10 years which is just insane. Until recently Liverpool were always a thorn in our side and they usually pushed us to the last game. Thankfully the league allows us to do what's needed elsewhere but away at Anfield was always a game to worry about.
 
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jimharri said:
We've clearly underachieved in the competition. One CL in the 10 years under Pep is underwhelming, given the quality of the sides we've had. We should have beaten an average Chelsea side in 2021. One of Pep's legendary brainfarts cost us that night. And, in my opinion, the Centurions team were good enough to win the competition in that period. We were screwed by the referee when we played the dips that season. And, like many on here, that defeat to Lyon still haunts me. That Sterling miss will forevr be etched in my memory.
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Helped me get over his one at Burnley.

Every cloud…
 
One of the ways I’m consoling myself about Pep’s departure and a deep fear that he’s irreplaceable, is that for 9 of the 10 years he was here the CL was won by a different manager.
 
We were competing against the best teams unfortunately...

Fernandinho-KDB-Silva midfield was great, but in UCL that wasn't enough.
We struggled a lot under man-2-man pressure and that's how Klopp broke our centurion's system.

Our results started to improve as soon as Rodri-Bernardo duo became the cornerstone of our midfield,
as man-2-man pressure wasn't working on them as both of them were capable to keep the ball against 2-3 opponents and therefore finding pass for the attackers who had plenty of space.

That's when our results started to improve. It was noticeable in 2019/2020, when we won against Zidane's Madrid, but
starting from 2020/2021 we were one of the best teams in Europe, if not the best.

2021 -> Final
2022 -> Semi-Final
2023 -> Final
2024 -> Final (Yes, those penalties decided title-winner)

Then Rodri injury happened and we declined again.

Should have won 4 out of 4 like we did in case of PL, but won only 1.
 
I’d rather have the 6 Premier League titles than even one UCL for me it’s was always the PL if I’d had a choice Obviously I was glad we won it and to do so as a treble even better
Coupled with 20 in 10 then there is no doubting the man
 
I know we won it, but overall 3/10, bonkers at best, mediocre to pathetic in reality. He really left some proper shithousery management for this tournament and made us RM bitches in the end.
Only part of Pep's history I won't remember fondly. As the saying goes, you win some, you lose some, but in the CL we mostly lost when it mattered, sometimes in spectacular and bone aching fashion.
 
For me best in the world for 5 seasons. In reality we should have managed at least 3 finals and won at least 2 with what we had.

But Pep always battled on all fronts and there's a price to pay for doing that when we really didn't have the deep squad everyone else seems to think.

Having said that, I think he did ok overall so this once I'll let it slide....
 
First question should be if Pep were at any other club than City, how many Champions League titles would his teams have won in 10 years

Manchester City have been handed a life sentence for the crimes we didn't commit ? NO other club in world football has had to defend itself more than us, Proven to be innocent, cleared of any wrongdoing by CAS, but somehow we were fined £10million, then the stink started by the Premier League

Anyway, back to the question, Pep and City have had a tremendous run in the Champions League, but somehow ended up always playing Real Madrid. Winning the Champions League is just about the hardest thing to win for English clubs.

The schedule in england is so demanding for the top clubs with the best players, then you add 3 to 5 international breaks over the season, it breaks down to about 70 plus games

Pep and Manchester City have won it, that is good enough for me
 
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