Few coaches have influenced football as significantly as Pep Guardiola.
From Mikel Arteta leading Arsenal to the top of the Premier League, to Vincent Kompany’s Bayern Munich dominating the Bundesliga, the Catalan counts some of the game’s finest managers among his proteges.
Another two of his disciples, Chelsea boss Enzo Maresca and Cardiff City head coach Brian Barry-Murphy, will be reunited when their teams meet in an EFL Cup quarter-final on Tuesday.
Barry-Murphy succeeded Maresca as manager of the Manchester City Elite Development Squad in 2021, with the Italian rejoining the club as Guardiola’s first-team assistant coach a year later.
The two had a season together in Manchester before Maresca was appointed Leicester City boss, guiding the Foxes to Premier League promotion in his first season.
Coincidentally, Barry-Murphy then also followed Maresca to Leicester, albeit six months after the former Sevilla midfielder had left to take the top job at Chelsea.
Two years into Maresca’s tenure at Stamford Bridge – and at a turbulent time for the Italian – he takes his Club World Cup champions to League One leaders Cardiff.
“He [Barry-Murphy] is doing a great job. They are top of the league, they are playing nice football and winning games,” says Maresca.
“It’s a dangerous game, a tricky game, so we need to have attention. We need to be careful because, again, we can achieve something important. That is the third semi-final in 18 months [for Chelsea under Maresca].”
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Maresca has endured a fraught few days at Chelsea. The 45-year-old described the 48 hours before Saturday’s 2-0 win over Everton as the “worst” of his reign, a cryptic but apparently pointed remark aimed at his club’s owners.
While Maresca was irked to be asked to clarify those comments on Monday, the mood was decidedly more relaxed at Cardiff City Stadium, where Barry-Murphy fielded questions about his friendship and working relationship with his Chelsea counterpart.
“He’s always been there for me and his staff, my admiration for him and his staff is obvious,” said Barry-Murphy.
“He’s a brilliant guy, my wife is a huge fan. Sometimes I think she prefers him to me. She’s a big fan of his wife and children, I should add.
“But when the game comes around, you have to be able to also compete against a club like Chelsea and understand that ourselves, we’re a very, very big club with a huge support base and trying to give those fans something to feel exhilarated by tomorrow.
“I think he’s the coach of the highest calibre, and he’s proven that in the short time he’s been there. He’s obviously taken lessons in the Premier League and now done an incredible job with Chelsea.”
Although they are operating at different levels, there are similarities in the ways that Maresca and Barry-Murphy see the game.
Like Guardiola, both men want their teams to dominate and attack, often by controlling possession and playing expansively.
The obvious difference on Tuesday will be that Maresca will have at his disposal a squad of enviable depth which won the Uefa Conference League and Club World Cup earlier this year, while Cardiff are playing in the third tier of English football for the first time in 22 years, albeit successfully.
“I think he has a very clear idea how he wants to see the game played. I think we all have different parts that make us all individual,” says Barry-Murphy.
“One of the biggest things I took from Man City was you always have to have your own way of doing things, your own beliefs. I’m my own man and I want to do things my own way.”
It is not only Maresca who Barry-Murphy will know in the opposition dugout at Cardiff City Stadium, the Irishman having coached several Chelsea players at their previous clubs.
“It’s a little bit unusual because of the crossover between the amount of players who’ve been at Manchester City and even back in the day at Rochdale, where I was manager of Robert Sanchez, or he managed me. No, I love him,” Barry-Murphy jokes.
“I was at Leicester last season and Facundo Buonanotte was there, brilliant player on loan from Brighton. Then there’s Romeo Lavia, Cole Palmer and Liam Delap – who’s suspended – at Manchester City. All those guys, unusual connection.”
Maresca has promised to make changes for this game, given Chelsea’s Premier League and Champions League commitments.
No matter how much he rotates his squad, though, Chelsea will still be overwhelming favourites, even if that tag does not sit easily.
“These are the worst games,” says Maresca.
“Football is full of these kinds of games where the favourite one, they can lose.
“That’s why the focus has to be on Cardiff.”
For Cardiff, there is nothing to lose.
Four points clear at the top of League One, playing attractive football with a team packed full of local young talent and welcoming former Champions League winners to their home on Tuesday, the Bluebirds have rediscovered their joy this season.
“The biggest thing always I learned from the players is there’s different spells in my career where an occasion like tomorrow night was quite a daunting task,” says Barry-Murphy.
“You think about the difficulties you may face, but the young players here have got no fear.
“They really attack every single situation that they come up against and try and overcome every obstacle.
“No matter what happens tomorrow, I’m sure the players will give every single thing they have for the club and come out the following day better players for it.”
BBC
