On BayernZone,they're already talking about replacing Pep with Klopp
I am not surprised. Pep hasn't achieved anything that any normal good coach like Mancini can't achieve with this squad and against this competition. Its just as easy if not easier than winning Serie A with Juve while flopping in Europe.
Pep's best quality is not to improve an already good team. His best quality is to take a team that had no working system and find a way that emphasizes the best qualities of most of the available players. He can transform a losing team into a winning one. But to get a winning team that already has a winning mentality to win even more is a different story. Pep's gift to Barca was finding a system that brings out the best qualities of Messi, Iniesta and Xavi while hides the weaknesses of the defense.
Its similar to Conte's story with us. He gave us a winning mentality and found a system that brings out the best qualities of Pirlo, Vidal and our three center-backs. He then struggled at making the tweaks needed to get more out of the players after the system has become stabilized. The main difference is that Guardiola built a system around much better players than ours. But even when you consider Guardiola's last decline in Barca, he didn't have a plan B and couldnt tweak his plan A and get more out of it much like how Conte couldnt get more out of the 3-5-2 despite having better new attackers.
Now the question is, can Guardiola and Conte do the same job somewhere else. If you give them a good squad that doesnt have a working system like Inter or Tottenham and are underachieving, would they be able to grow a system out of the set of players that these squads have or do you think they would import the systems from their old clubs that may or may not be suited for their new squads?
I think its the latter. Conte's 3-5-2 and Guardiola's tiki taka grew out of the squads that they had. The coaches didnt make up this game-plan and then impose on the squads but they rather developed these game plans from the attributes of the players they had available. It seems that both Guardiola and Conte took their respective game-plans that grew out of their squads and are now trying to impose it wherever they go regardless of the qualities of the players they have in their new jobs.
Guardiola took a perfectly working system and squad and imposed his Barca plan on them and then pulled them back. Bayern are also enjoying the some limitations that barca had around the end of his tenure. If Guardiola is to truly be a genius, then he has to grow a new system out of his current set of players to great success. The squad should shape his plan not the otherway around.
Conte is doinng the same thing with Italy. While Italy shares the same core that Juve has, our plan grew out of Pirlo more than anyone else and Conte wont have a Pirlo no more. He is going to have to grow a new system from this dysfunctional mess and if he succeeds I'd happily consider him a genius tactician.
I dont see Allegri as a system finder at all but rather as a tweaker. Give him (or Ancellotti) a winning team and he will improve it. Don't give him a team in rubble and expect him to build something out of it.
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