Brilliant present, uncertain future as Guardiola turns 40 (Feature)

By Daniel Garcia Marco Jan 17, 2011, 16:31 GMT

Madrid - Josep Guardiola turns 40 on Tuesday, surrounded by record figures and generous praise.

The future could turn him into a legend, but the secretive Barcelona coach has not even announced yet whether or not he will stay on the job next season.

What are Guardiola's plans for the short and medium terms? That is the question on everybody's lips at the Camp Nou stadium.

'The truth is that I cannot imagine Barcelona without Pep (Guardiola),' superstar Lionel Messi told reporters last week.

The comment hinted at the mystery surrounding an extension of the coach's contract, which expires in June.

Most people assume that the contract will be extended by one year, as has been the case in the past, despite the wish of Barcelona president Sandro Rosell to keep him forever and to turn him into a sort of Alex Ferguson, the seemingly-eternal manager at Manchester United.

But Rosell will not give up. He wants Guardiola to be for Barcelona what Franz Beckenbauer has been for Bayern Munich: everything.

'Some day he will be president of Barça,' Rosell said recently, with reference to the coach.

For now, Guardiola is young for the presidency. Indeed, although he has already won eight titles, he is only in his third season as first-team coach.

'I won't be here forever,' he says.

And the comment scares Barcelona fans and gives hope to those of their rivals.

'Results rule in this line of work,' he explains.

Guardiola has coached Barcelona for 153 matches, of which he won 112, drew 28 and lost 13. His men are on an unbeaten streak that lasts 28 matches in all tournaments, a club record. And he has beaten arch-rivals Real Madrid on all five clashes, with historic thrashings like the 2-6 of 2009 at the Santiago Bernabeu and the recent 5-0 at the Camp Nou.

'Guardiola will have a place in history, like (Arrigo) Sacchi, or (Johan) Cruyff, and also Ferguson. They have left something else, they have created a system of play that is different from what there was before, and they have also won things,' playmaker Xavi Hernandez said in an interview with the French daily L'Equipe.

'He always has an eye on us, an eye on the details, on me and on the whole squad. Personally, he has looked for better positions for me on the pitch, he has allowed me to be closer to midfielders and to be more in contact with the ball,' says Messi.

As a player, Guardiola was at the heart of the Barcelona Dream Team of the 1990s, a football masterpiece that changed forever the way the sport was approached in the Catalan city. And he, like a good prophet of that religion, has led it to perfection.

Cruyff called upon Guardiola, who had risen from the club's youth ranks, to play for the first team in 1991.

In May 2008, although he only had one year's experience as coach with Barcelona B, the club's second team, then-president Joan Laporta called upon him to rebuild the team. Barça had just got over an era marked by Brazilian star Ronaldinho, which was very successful at the start but then turned bitter, and which was ephemeral anyway.

It was again Cruyff, the club's ideologue and an advisor to Laporta, who picked Guardiola. And the coach delivered a style from the start: a short beard, an elegant look, a quiet voice. An icon for men and women, the subject of books on leadership, the brand image for a bank.

Guardiola, as a player, won six editions of La Liga, one Champions League and an Olympic gold medal with Spain. He was the captain and the symbol of Barcelona.

With an educational background that is uncommon in football, Guardiola theorized on the sport. His restlessness led him to leave the club that had been his life to seek adventure in Italy. There, he gained experience in tactics at Brescia and Roma.

And there too he lived his most bitter experience, when he tested positive for doping with the substance nandrolone in 2001. He fought to clear his name, and in 2007 he was absolved by an appeals court in Brescia.

Then he played in Qatar and Mexico. He recently supported Qatar's bid for the 2022 World Cup, and some believe that he is behind the fact that the Qatar Foundation appears from next season in the coveted Barcelona shirt, until now always clean of commercial ads. The club is to get 150 million euros (close to 200 million dollars) over five years.

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