Pep Guardiola and his Manchester City side further tightened their stranglehold on English football by sealing a fourth consecutive Premier League title in 2023/24.
City can secure another piece of history by beating Manchester United in the FA Cup final on May 25, which would make them the first English team to win the domestic double in consecutive seasons.
Overall, Guardiola has won six Premier League titles in eight seasons at the helm, along with 11 other honours including the club’s maiden UEFA Champions League crown in 2022/23.
Quite understandably, rivals and fans of other clubs are increasingly keen to know when this might all stop. After the title-sealing win over West Ham
, Guardiola offered them a sliver of hope.
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“Last year, after [the Champions League final in] Istanbul, I said ‘it’s over, there’s nothing left’,” he told a post-match press conference. “But I have a contract and I start to think ‘no-one has done four in a row, why don’t we try?’. And now I feel it’s done, so what next? Now I don’t know what exactly the motivation is because it’s difficult to find it when everything is done.”
Speaking to Sky Sports, Guardiola added: “The reality is I am closer to leaving than staying. We have talked with the club – my feeling is that I want to stay now. I will stay next season and during the season we will talk. But eight or nine years – we will see.”
😂 “Arteta is in his office going PLEASE LEAVE”
Pep Guardiola on his future at Manchester City 🔵 pic.twitter.com/rCmBH0hxlZ
— Sky Sports Premier League (@SkySportsPL) May 19, 2024
When does Pep Guardiola’s Man City contract expire?
Guardiola’s current deal runs until the end of the 2024/25 season.
He joined City after three campaigns at Bayern Munich in 2016. It means that his City tenure is already double the length of his transformative four-year stint at Barcelona between 2008 and 2012.
At the City Football Academy working under director of football Txiki Begiristain, his long-time friend and former Barcelona teammate, City have kept Guardiola happy and motivated with an optimised working environment.
The warmth with which he spoke about his rivalry with outgoing Liverpool manager Jurgen Klopp after the West Ham game underlined how the competitive challenge of the Premier League also keeps him motivated, irrespective of the now familiar outcomes at the end of the season.
Guardiola joined on an initial three-year contract in 2016 and penned an extension running until June 2021 after City stormed to the Premier League title with a record-breaking 100-point haul in 2017/18.
There have been two subsequent two-year extensions signed in 2020 and 2022. Guardiola agreed his new terms in November of each of those years. As such, all eyes should be on the third international break of the 2024/25 season to see what Guardiola does next.
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Pep Guardiola possible replacements at Man City
Ahead of a 2023 FA Cup tie against Burnley, Guardiola talked up the prospect of his former captain Vincent Kompany taking the City hot seat one day. The Belgian’s star was on the rise at that point as his team were bound for the Championship title. However, a chastening and sometimes naive relegation campaign in the Premier League has perhaps lowered his stock, but maybe not in the eyes of Bayern Munich who are reportedly interested in appointing him to succeed Thomas Tuchel.
Girona head coach Michel has potential as an internal appointment of sorts, given LaLiga’s 2023/24 surprise package are part-owned by the City Football Group. There have been obvious Guardiola notes to spot, from the goalkeeper being heavily involved building play to wingers stationed high and wide, in their superb run to Champions League qualification.
Xabi Alonso has ripped up the record books in an astonishing season at Bayer Leverkusen and is a Guardiola disciple of sorts, having played under the Catalan at Bayern Munich. At the end of next season, Bayern or Real Madrid might feel like more likely destinations for Alonso, but he should be on City’s radar.
Guardiola has professed gushing admiration for Roberto De Zerbi, who is at a loose end for now following his departure from Brighton. A leftfield and probably unlikely move would be to bring the Italian in as one of Guardiola’s rolling cast of assistants next term to learn the inner workings of the City machine before taking over.