Pep Guardiola is, once again, at the gates of footballing Olympus. In 2009, with Barcelona, he made history by winning the Champions League final against Manchester United and becoming the youngest coach (38 years and 129 days) to win it.
It was his debut in the elite dugouts and, months later, he became the first to win the sextuple: LaLiga, Copa del Rey, Champions League, Spanish and European Super Cup and Club World Cup. He won it all. A milestone that only Hansi Flick has since repeated.
"The Champions League has given me many bad moments... but it has given me much more than I could have ever imagined," Guardiola admitted to UEFA.
He is not wrong. He has won three, one as a player and two as a coach. All with Barcelona.
"I've reached ten semi-finals and now I'm going for my fourth final [as coach]," he added.
Only Carlo Ancelotti has coached in more finals. As far as coaches are concerned, he could join Bob Paisley and Zinedine Zidane on the second step of the list.
Guardiola will be looking for an unprecedented unparalleled feat in the final against Inter: becoming the first coach to win the treble on two occasions.
He can do it, to make matters more interesting, with two different clubs: Barcelona and City. It is worth remembering that only nine teams have managed to win League, Cup and Champions League in the same year: Celtic (1967), Ajax (1972), PSV (1988), Manchester United (1999), Barcelona (2009 and 2015), Inter (2010) and Bayern (2013 and 2023).
The Spanish coach already achieved an unprecedented 'quadruple' in English football in 2019: he won the Premier League, FA Cup, League Cup and Community Shield.
In 2020/21 he was on the verge of another, less orthodox treble: Premier League, League Cup... and Champions League. Chelsea, however, took the European Cup final and left him in the cold.
"Now they have more experience. Sometimes, to win something, you have to lose it first," warns Domenec Torrent, Pep's former assistant at Bayern and City.
Now he will be looking to make amends against Inter.
"It's unfair, but we have to accept that if we want to take a definitive step forward as a club, we have to win the Champions League, it can't be avoided," Pep acknowledges.
"You have to be ambitious, but not greedy," says Guardiola, who has 34 titles on the bench. If he wins the Champions League, he will equal Lucescu (35) as the second most successful manager in history. Only Alex Ferguson (49) would surpass him... but with a much longer career.
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