Has Pep Guardiola lost what made him a special manager

After two losses from their first four Premier League games of the season, Manchester City now risks finishing the term without being champions again.

It is a surprise that they will go back-to-back campaigns without winning a league crown, especially as they did not win any title last term.

It was only the second time since the 2017-2018 season that City had not won the league crown, as Liverpool were champions in 2020.

Apart from that time, City had won six of seven league crowns and were on a run of four straight wins when Liverpool halted them again.

Before last term, Arsenal had finished second in two consecutive seasons, and we expected the Gunners to be the next champions if City failed to win a title.

If Arsenal had won the Premier League crown last season, most people would have understood, but Liverpool did.

So it was not Mikel Arteta, a student of Guardiola, who won the crown? That came as a surprise, but perhaps a bigger surprise was City not winning any trophy.

They tried to avoid that disaster and drew up a solid January plan to save their season by adding some top players to their squad.

However, it did not work and they had to let go of some of their old and important players in the summer.

After further splashing the cash on new stars, they had a squad that was too big, and Guardiola asked for changes.

City offloaded the likes of Kevin de Bruyne, Jack Grealish and Manuel Akanji, among other key members of their squad.

Guardiola seemed tired of these stars and wants a new start as he bids to begin a new winning cycle in England.

The beginning of an era at the Etihad

Who can blame him for wanting change? This is a manager who has seen his team move from being the club everyone fears because of their consistency and dominance in games to one that small clubs fancy beating.

When Guardiola arrived in the Premier League in 2016, he inherited a City team that was in poor shape, so by the end of the 2016/2017 season, he won no trophy for the first time in his managerial career.

Guardiola knew he had to make changes, even though he had signed Leroy Sane, Ilkay Gundogan, John Stones, and Gabriel Jesus, among others, during his first season at the club.

In the summer of 2017, City flushed out the likes of Samir Nasri, Jesús Navas, Gael Clichy, Bacary Sagna, Eliaquim Mangala, and Joe Hart, among others.

This made room for the arrival of Bernardo Silva, Ederson, Kyle Walker, Danilo, and Benjamin Mendy, among others.

Guardiola achieved instant success that season as City collected 100 Premier League points, which remains a record to this day.

Despite strong competition from Liverpool in the next campaign, they retained the league crown, with the Reds forcing them to reach 98 points, with Liverpool finishing the season on 97 points.

But in the 2019/20 season, Liverpool disrupted Manchester City’s winning streak and became champions of England.

The Reds had long aspired to be champions and remain competitive, but City would go on to win the next four league titles until the 2024/2025 season.

In the years that City dominated the Premier League, one key factor in their success was Guardiola.

His tactics and player management made it easy for them to win against any opponent in England, and he changed the game in the Premier League.

Last season, as City struggled, we wondered if the Citizens should sack their manager, but nothing can be taken away from the fact that Guardiola’s arrival in England changed the game.

More managers now want to play like him, signing goalkeepers who can play from the back and players capable of keeping possession and evading a press, while knowing how to press opponents.

How much did money play in Guardiola’s successful years?

Even fans who support the club and buy Manchester City tickets will admit that without money, their team would not be as successful as it has been under Guardiola.

Liverpool broke the transfer record for defenders when they signed Virgil van Dijk for £75 million in 2018, but overall, City are the pacesetters when it comes to splashing the cash on players, especially defenders.

They had spent £57m on Laporte, £49m on Benjamin Mendy, and £45m on Kyle Walker all in one summer, which led to their first league crown in 2018.

Over the years, they spent £100m euros on Grealish, which helped them to win the Champions League and a treble in 2023.

Guardiola has earned a reputation for being a chequebook manager for much of his career,  as he also splashed the cash on world-class players at Barcelona and Bayern Munich.

He still spends so much money, and City spent more than £300 million euros between the winter and summer 2025 windows, so his team should be doing better.

Has Pep Guardiola lost what made him special?

Despite the significant outlay to bolster his squad this year, Manchester City no longer excites fans who buy Premier League tickets as it did before.

They were invincible to an extent for so many seasons and struck fear into opponents even before their matches began.

This includes Liverpool and  Arsenal, who were their main rivals, but nowadays, teams and managers know how to beat City.

Before the FA Cup final, Oliver Glasner had boasted that his team would beat Man City if the Citizens used the same system they had used in a previous league game against them.

He kept his word and beat City in that final to lift the trophy, while Arne Slot outsmarted Guardiola to lead Liverpool to the league crown in his first season as manager last term.

Slot has been a long-term student of Guardiola, and most managers in the country now fall in a similar category.

They have learned from Guardiola and made modifications that make it easy for them to beat him.

However, there is also an argument that he has lost the best players for his system, and the current group needs time to blend and bring success back to the team.

If City continues to lose to teams like Tottenham and Brighton, they risk finishing this season worse than they did in the last campaign.

So, the time has come for Guardiola to start winning matches, because the other top sides, like Arsenal and Liverpool, will leave them behind if they don’t.