Arsenal’s Kai Havertz, right, kicks the ball ahead of Chelsea’s Maxence Lacroix during the English Premier League soccer match between Arsenal and Chelsea on September 6, 2026
| Photo Credit: AP

The 10 years Pep Guardiola spent at Manchester City represent one of the greatest acts of dynasty-building in the sporting universe.

Not only did the Catalan coach City to six Premier League titles, five League Cups, three FA Cups, one UEFA Champions League crown and one at the FIFA Club World Cup, he did so by assembling multiple great sides, revolutionising tactics, and constantly reinventing himself.

Dominant reign

Guardiola’s six Premier League trophies are second only to Alex Ferguson’s 13 at Manchester United, and even in the four years when City did not win the top prize, it stayed in the top three. No other coach won more than one Premier League title during Guardiola’s time in England.

When such a king abdicates the throne and leaves his kingdom, as Guardiola did at the end of the 2025-26 campaign, there is bound to be an almighty jostle among those below to be the immediate heir. The 2026-27 Premier League season, which got underway late on Friday (August 21), will be the battleground to decide whom the power is transferred to.

The setting is conducive for an intriguing competition. City without Guardiola will be one of nine clubs to have new coaches, and two others in Manchester United and Tottenham Hotspur did not have Michael Carrick and Roberto De Zerbi in place at the start of the year.

Mikel Arteta, who secured Arsenal its first English top-flight crown in 22 years, is the most experienced, having been in the job for a little over six years and seven months. Unai Emery, who masterminded Aston Villa’s 2025-26 Europa League triumph, is next, with a stint now at roughly three years and 10 months.

Though Guardiola has exited the scene, his giant shadow still looms. Enzo Maresca, who has replaced the 55-year-old at the Etihad, and Arteta have served as his assistants. Xabi Alonso, installed as Chelsea’s new manager, was once Guardiola’s midfield marshal at Bayern Munich.

The post-Pep Premier League era will not have a clean break in terms of tactics too, for Guardiola has left a deep imprint, both in terms of the first principles he introduced, and how he evolved and shed his orthodoxies to cater to the League’s fast-changing demands.

When he first arrived, Guardiola was a cleric of the possession-heavy school and was canonical in his belief that retaining the ball was the best route to success. So much so that even goalkeepers weren’t spared; one of his first decisions at City was to replace Joe Hart, a top-class shot-stopper, with Claudio Bravo, a ball-playing goalie.

And it felt like the league as a whole — with the glorious exception of Jose Mourinho’s Manchester United — was trying to inculcate parts of it.

Guardiola then changed tack to embrace high-energy players and those with great individual skills in order to adjust to the breathless, end-to-end football that the likes of Jurgen Klopp (Liverpool) and Mauricio Pochettino (Tottenham) introduced. The controlled aggression of the earlier years made way for a more expressive and expansive style.

Philosophical blasphemy

And in his last four seasons in charge, he played with one of world football’s purest strikers in Erling Haaland. For a man who once made Lionel Messi turn out as a False 9, and then won two Premier League trophies in 2020-21 and 2021-22 with midfielders as top-scorers (Ilkay Gundogan with 13 goals and Kevin de Bruyne 15), to have Haaland score 112 times over four campaigns would have been akin to philosophical blasphemy.

However, football is now more direct and physical than in recent times and it is to Guardiola’s credit that he tweaked his methods and put in place a blueprint for success. “You need to adapt, evolve,” City’s Maresca said recently. “Set-pieces, man to man — it’s a little bit the direction where football is going. We managers… it’s our duty to find solutions.”

Who among Arteta, Carrick, Alonso, Andoni Iraola and Maresca will answer the call? For one, the sight of Arteta, Carrick and Alonso walking briskly up and down the touchline is sure to remind fans of their glory days as players for Arsenal, Manchester United and Liverpool not so long ago. For a certain generation, it will appear like they are reliving a childhood dream.

Arteta has the first-mover advantage, having already won the League and possessing a winning combination. The addition of Bruno Guimaraes from Newcastle for GBP 75 million will reduce the inordinate burden on midfielder Declan Rice. But Arsenal’s unsuccessful pursuit of Vinicius Junior suggests that the outfit is mindful of the need of a world-class threat upfront.

Carrick, who took over at Old Trafford after the sacking of Ruben Amorim, had an impressive stint as caretaker manager, winning 12 and drawing three of his 17 matches in 2025-26, and helping United qualify for the Champions League after a two-season hiatus. The question before the astute 45-year-old is whether his United has the quality to sustain simultaneous domestic and continental challenges.

For Alonso, Chelsea is the opportunity to light up an aura that has seemingly dimmed after a failed seven-month stint as Real Madrid’s boss. The 44-year-old is known to possess a shrewd tactical brain, and his role in ending Bayern Munich’s hegemony in Germany — 11 straight Bundesliga titles from 2012-13 to 2022-23 — by leading a young Bayer Leverkusen side to its maiden crown is noteworthy. The addition of 24-year-old English attacking midfielder Morgan Rogers for a whopping GBP 117 million shows that he has Chelsea’s wholehearted trust.

Andoni Iraola’s ascent to the top job at Liverpool after making a mark at Bournemouth is eerily similar to Graham Potter’s entry into Chelsea in 2022 after a stellar show at Brighton & Hove Albion. But Potter was dismissed in less than seven months, a fate Iraola will want to avoid.

The 44-year-old is agnostic to any style of play that is not front-footed, a factor that endeared him to the Liverpool hierarchy after a dreary end to Arne Slot’s time. Can he manage to keep the club faithful happy without the services of Mohamed Salah, who left after nine glorious years?

Tough act to follow

Maresca’s situation at City is comparable to what David Moyes faced at United after the latter succeeded Ferguson in 2013. The Italian’s first test will be to not get crushed under the burden of expectations after Guardiola’s supremely successful tenure. It helps that City is not known to be trigger-happy, for both Roberto Mancini and Manuel Pellegrini enjoyed tenures lasting three years or more before Guardiola arrived.

Maresca also comes with a certain pedigree, having led Chelsea to FIFA Club World Cup glory in 2025, and has added England midfielder Elliot Anderson for a hefty GBP 116 million fee. But he will have to compete without the talismanic World Cup winner Rodri, who has shifted to Barcelona, and fellow playmaker Bernardo Silva, who has moved to Real Madrid.

Will he be guided by the spirit of Guardiola or will the ghost of Guardiola haunt him?

Atalanta’s hat-trick hero Ademola Lookman holds the trophy after his team won the Europa League final against Bayer Leverkusen at the Aviva Stadium in Dublin, Ireland, Wednesday, May 22, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AP

Ademola Lookman scored a stunning hat-trick as Atalanta beat Bayer Leverkusen 3-0 in the Europa League final on Wednesday to win just the second major trophy in their 117-year history and end the German champions’ remarkable unbeaten streak.

Lookman, who struggled to establish himself in the English Premier League with Everton, Fulham and Leicester City before reviving his career in Italy under Atalanta coach Gian Piero Gasperini, struck twice inside the first 26 minutes before sealing the win 15 minutes from fulltime.

ALSO READ |Bayer Leverkusen secure maiden German league title with 5-0 win over Bremen

The victory ended Gasperini’s own two-decade long pursuit of major silverware as his side totally outplayed Xabi Alonso’s Leverkusen – or ‘Neverlusen’ as they had been dubbed after going an incredible 51 games unbeaten.

But just as they did against Premier League heavyweights Liverpool and three-times finalists Olympique de Marseille in the previous two rounds, Atalanta didn’t give their opponents a sniff to mark their first European final with a famous victory.

“We needed to be attacking, it was not enough just to defend. We know these teams are great at attacking. Everyone was extraordinary,” Gasperini told Sky Sports Italia, referring to the teams his side beat to become the first Italian winners of the competition since Parma 25 years ago.

“The way we did it was the most important thing, we deserved it without a shadow of a doubt against such a strong team. Winning the Europa League is an extraordinary achievement.”

Leverkusen started the game looking decidedly unsure of themselves and some uncharacteristically sloppy play handed the first chance of the game to Gianluca Scamacca, who didn’t get enough on his header from a fine Matteo Ruggeri cross.

It was an early warning shot and the purposeful Italians struck within minutes when Davide Zappacosta was allowed far too much space down the right before Lookman beat a flatfooted Exequiel Palacios to the cut back to stroke home the opener.

Lookman was mobbed by his team mates and substitutes who were in dreamland 14 minutes later.

Another Leverkusen error gifted possession to the Nigeria forward, who skipped past one defender and curled a beautiful right-footed shot into the bottom-right corner from just outside the box.

Stunning strike

The stunned Germans showed brief flashes of how quickly they can turn it on in attack but little came of it and it was Charles De Ketelaere who came closest on the break as Atalanta did not show a shred of debut final nerves nor any effects from the absence of injured captain Marten de Roon.

Leverkusen swapped defender Josip Stanisic for top scorer Victor Boniface at halftime but it changed little as both sets of travelling fans continued to create the kind of Aviva Stadium noise matched only by some of the Irish rugby teams’ famous wins or memorable international soccer nights of years gone by.

Leverkusen had only failed to score once during the run that featured 42 wins in all competitions and 17 goals scored in or after the 90th minute, but the chances of another comeback faded away against the resolute Atalanta backline.

Lookman completely extinguished them on the counterattack with another stunning strike into the top corner, this time with his left foot to complete his hat-trick, the sixth in a major European final and first since Jupp Heynckes’ for Borussia Moenchengladbach in the 1975 UEFA Cup.

He was flung into the air by his team mates 15 minutes later when the final whistle blew and the Bergamo club ended the 61-year wait since their 1963 Italian Cup triumph.

“It’s one of the best nights of my life,” Lookman, who cradled the matchball as he collected his winners’ medal, told TNT Sports.

“It was an amazing performance from the team. We did it… We made history tonight.”

Leverkusen’s Granit Xhaka celebrates with team mates after the German cup match between Bayer 04 Leverkusen and Fortuna Duesseldorf in Leverkusen, Germany on April 3, 2024.
| Photo Credit: AP

Bayer Leverkusen is on the verge of a historic league and cup double in Germany after sweeping aside local rival Fortuna Duesseldorf 4-0 in the German Cup semifinals.

Florian Wirtz scored twice on Wednesday as Xabi Alonso’s team, which also leads the Bundesliga by 13 points, marked its 40th game of the season unbeaten in all competitions.

Leverkusen faces off in the May 25 cup final at Berlin’s Olympiastadion against second-tier Kaiserslautern, which ended the surprise run of third-division Saarbruecken with a 2-0 win on Tuesday.

On a wet night, Leverkusen took the lead in the seventh minute when Jeremie Frimpong seized on a loose ball at the far post and lofted a shot over goalkeeper Florian Kastenmeier.

That forced Fortuna to open up its play in search of a goal, and Leverkusen promptly responded with a searing counterattack.

Three passes took the ball from Leverkusen’s touchline to the back of Fortuna’s net as Amine Adli made it 2-0. Soon it was three as Kastenmeier gave the ball away to Leverkusen midfielder Robert Andrich, who set up Wirtz to score.

Wirtz scored another from the penalty spot after a handball, before Leverkusen celebrated the return of striker Victor Boniface, back in action for the club for the first time since December after he was injured while training with Nigeria ahead of the Africa Cup of Nations.

Leverkusen had a further boost last week when Alonso said he would stay on as coach amid speculation linking him with Liverpool and Bayern Munich. Since then, Leverkusen has won both its games and seen Bayern coach Thomas Tuchel concede the Bundesliga title race.

Fortuna, which is pushing for promotion from the second division, was a heavy underdog ahead of the game, even before its star midfielder Ao Tanaka was ruled out.

The Japan international had to go into urgent surgery to remove his appendix and gave his teammates a pregame thumbs-up gesture from a hospital bed.