Revealed: Where does Pep Guardiola rank amongst the world’s best managers? | OneFootball

FourFourTwo have revealed where the likes of Pep Guardiola and Paris Saint-Germain boss Luis Enrique rank amongst their top 50 managers in world football.

Guardiola endured the most challenging season of his managerial career by his own admission last term, with Manchester City finishing third in the Premier League with a meagre 71-point tally, crashing out of the UEFA Champions League at the Round of 16 stage and losing the FA Cup final to Crystal Palace.

Manchester City are going through a crossroads summer of change across the board as they shuffle their ranks from top to bottom, starting with Hugo Viana replacing Txiki Begiristain as director of football.

City have also seen assistant coach trio Juanma Lillo, Carlos Vicens and Inigo Dominguez leave at the end of their respective contracts, with Pepijn Lijnders and James French joining as assistant and set-piece coaches respectively.

Kevin De Bruyne and Scott Carson have left the club at the end of their contracts, with Kyle Walker also set to go. Kalvin Phillips and Jack Grealish, like Walker, have been left out of the FIFA Club World Cup squad and are expected to find new clubs before the new season begins.

However, City have acted early in the transfer window and secured the arrivals of Rayan Ait-Nouri, Marcus Bettinelli, Rayan Cherki and Tijjani Reijnders – an early statement of intent from Viana to give Guardiola a much-needed lease of new life and injection of fresh blood into his injury-prone, depleted squad.

Manchester City have needed inspiration for some time and chairman Khaldoon Al Mubarak admitted that in hindsight, the club should have approached last summer’s transfer window more aggressively.

City succumbed to an injury crisis across the squad last term that forced the club to enter the January transfer market and address their personnel concerns – signing Omar Marmoush, Nico Gonzalez, Abdukodir Khusanov and Vitor Reis for a combined £181.5 million.

Guardiola has enjoyed the privileges of a bloated squad filled with quality since Manchester City landed in the United States for the Club World Cup, where three wins in three group-stage games have seen the Blues set up a Round of 6 tie with Al-Hilal this weekend.

City will need to trim their squad and cut down the wage bill before the beginning of the 2025-26 campaign, which could see the likes of John Stones or Oscar Bobb leave the club after enduring an injury-riddled 12 months or so.

In a ranking of the world’s top 50 managers, FourFourTwo have ranked Pep Guardiola in fourth place following Manchester City’s sub-standard 2024-25 campaign, which does signal a tint of recency bias for even the most anti-Guardiola contingent.

Guardiola stands behind PSG boss Luis Enrique (1st place), who has recently led the French giants to a historic treble; Arne Slot (2nd place), who has spearheaded Liverpool to Premier League glory in his first season at Anfield; and and Simone Inzaghi, who lost his second UEFA Champions League final in three years after receiving a 5-0 thrashing at the hands of PSG and Enrique in May.