Whoot...there it is. It's now official. What we all suspected is now bottom line and crystal clear. Pellegrini will leave this summer and Pep Guardiola will take over as Manchester City manager. There we have it. City have been tracking their man for some time and have finally lured him away from Bayern into their kennel. As for Pellegrini, the writing was on the wall and this was inevitable.
Pellegrini's time at City can be argued to have been a success. Trophies were won, including the league title. His only blip was not getting further in the Champions League. Winning it was out of the question as Bayern, Barcelona, Madrid and PSG are just on a different level to them. But not reaching the semis is a red mark on Pellegrini's report card. A team with that much money to spend and the squad they have, really Pellegrini should have done a lot better.
This announcement should have been made when Ancelotti was announced as the next Bayern manager. Once that was certified, everyone assumed that we would also hear Pellegrini would be leaving City. But there was no word. Then it was a debate of whether it would be City or United, but most people had their eyes on the Etihad contingent because of how long they had Guardiola on their radar.
It was a bad move on the part of City to not have let everyone know about this sooner. Seeing Pellegrini have to take questions, live under the speculation and continue to manage the team was wrong. I like things to all be laid out rather than hearing everyone and their grandma speculating as to how long Pellegrini would last at the City job.
I'm glad Pellegrini has taken on a new challenge. If he comes to City, after winning the Champions League with Bayern then he will be expected to do the same for the Manchester club. Nothing less will suffice. But if he isn't able to get that Champions League before coming to manage City, then he will have some lead time, but ultimately the pressure will eventually come back in winning the trophy. That is why he was hired and it's what the owners want more than anything. The league is nice and having one over United is always good. But the lights shine brightest on the Champions League and that is the most valuable club trophy there is, because of the talent involved.
Pellegrini is a good coach, just not a great one, and he lacked consistency which meant he couldn't make City as dominant domestically as Ferguson did. Pep may remedy that, but he's going to find things tougher in England than he does at Germany.
All I ask is Pep plays Kelechi and does not waste his talent. If he does, then we're going to have a problem...
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HH
