The Manchester City way: 1xBet shares the success story of Europe’s best team

The global betting company 1xBet talks about the Manchester club’s success, which finally took the main European trophy and made a historic treble.

City new history

June 10 is when one part of Manchester rejoiced, and the other felt blue. In the Champions League final, Manchester City beat Inter and repeated the legendary team of Alex Ferguson’s achievement of 1999.

Guardiola’s team became the second in England after the Red Devils, which managed to win the treble. Before that, they took gold in the Premier League and the FA Cup. This is the second treble for Pep – in 2009, he won three trophies with Barcelona. By the way, Guardiola is the only one who achieved such a result with two different clubs.

Money that had to wait

Whatever they say about Guardiola’s genius, this success would never have happened without the Abu Dhabi United Group (ADUG) money, which bought the club in 2008 from former Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra. And although the head of ADUG, Sheikh Mansour, said outright that he wanted to turn City into one of Europe’s leading clubs, he had to make sure from his own experience that even big money needs time – the team managed to break into the Champions League only at the end of the 2010/2011 season. These were the times when Citizens fans were often asked on the continent what the three stars on the emblem of their favorite team meant – by that time, it had won the top league only twice (as a rule, in European club football, a star appears on the club emblem after 10 victories in the national championship). The Blues fans smiled sadly and said it was about three billion for transfers.

Luckily for the new owners, Man City won their first title of the 21st century already in the 2011/2012 season. Even then, it was obvious the club was financially solid, and its success in Europe is only a matter of time, proper management and patience. But years passed, and the team was far from the status of the best. Everything changed when one of the best coaches of our era came to Manchester.

Creator

Josep Maria Guardiola i Sala, or simply Pep, is the main success factor of this City. The Spanish GOAT (greatest of all time) built a great team and cemented its status in history. Pep turned City into a transformer with impressive game discipline (in his team, even Jack Grealish obediently does everything required), non-trivial interaction, well-established counter-pressing and picked up players of the highest level. This is not the Barcelona of 2009 – there is a different system, more complicated than his previous creation. And this system works like clockwork.

Shadow director

If you mix Guardiola’s system, all his principles, attitudes and requirements in a cauldron, and then brew one player from this potion, Bernardo Silva will appear in front of you. He is Guardiola’s Manchester City football.

Bernardo knows everything. The Portuguese influences the game at all its stages. He does a lot of rough work and runs an excellent 13 km per match. Bernardo absorbs any idea from Pep and is an extension of the coach on the field. Think about it: during his career at City, this player changed 26 roles in ten schemes. Played everywhere except the center of defense. And in every position, he did what Guardiola needed. Only De Bruyne, with his assisting superpower, has played more games under Pep.

Norwegian robot

When the team celebrated the title, Pep traditionally lit a cigar. Guardiola has been doing this for a long time, and Erling Haaland decided to repeat this trick after the coach. Cyborg, who drinks only specially filtered water, relaxed a little. He can – after all, he also became one of the wings that helped the team take off.

Haaland’s signing was the final cog in the system. His appearance gave Pep a solution to the implementation problems – since the days of Sergio Aguero in Man City, there has not been such an effective center forward. Viking had the best season of his career, breaking dozens of records. He became the top scorer in the current Champions League, having shot 12 balls into the opponents’ goal and becoming a real attack leader. In 31 official matches, when the forward scored, City have 27 wins and 4 draws. Without Haaland’s goals – 15 wins, 6 draws and 6 losses. City did not win in almost half of the cases without his effective actions.

Mind games

The last but not least success factor is the team’s microclimate. Remember the events of early 2023: Man City lost to Southampton and was relegated from the League Cup, the club was accused of financial fraud, and Arsenal firmly settled at the top of the Premier League standings. However, the players, together with the coach, were able to get out of the psychological hole and achieve a historic result.

When the sheikhs bought the club in 2008, they said they would be patient. 15 years have passed, and patience has been rewarded. All slots on the trophy shelf are filled.

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