Page 158 - Pep Guardiola: Another Way of Winning: The Biography

coaches meeting in Nyon – five months after Barcelona’s Champions League KO at the hands of Inter.
The pair were never on their own at the conference but Mourinho made an effort to make Guardiola,
in his first visit to the forum, welcome. Pep, nevertheless, could not help feeling a bit tense next to the
Portuguese coach.

Behind the amicable façade, José had decided that, in order to beat Barcelona, this extraordinary
collection of players that stood for one particular interpretation of the game of football, he had to
target their foundations, undermine and unsettle their cushioned life. Watching a Barça game just
before he became the Madrid manager, Mourinho was amazed at the way the referees effectively laid
out the red carpet for the Catalans, and how even opposition players and fans were in awe of their
talents and superiority. Mourinho decided that this had to finish, that Barcelona needed to be knocked
off their pedestal. And in order to do that, he would need to use every weapon in his armoury of

words, accusations and insinuations.
It was, of course, not a new strategy for Mourinho. He had used similar approaches in England and
Italy, adapting his methods to the respective countries. But the way he would execute his plan in
Spain would require taking those tactics to the extreme – not least because this time his rival would
be the most powerful he had ever encountered.
Two big names and strong personalities rode into town, and that town wasn’t big enough for the

both of them. Or, at least, that’s how the media liked to portray it.
Media and fans enjoy explaining the world through a set of values, prejudices and predetermined
points of view that configure the vision we have of it. That the world is becoming 140 characters long
(the length allowed by Twitter) reinforces the necessity of reducing the complexities of life in very
simple black and white terms.
It’s the latest chapter in a very old story. Barcelona and Madrid have always been understood as
two different institutional models, but, from that year, with José’s addition, it became as partisan and

polarised as at perhaps any point in the past. Mourinho provided the kind of theatrical confrontation
that this symbolic clash thrives upon. It’s a contest made in heaven because it is, without a doubt, a
mutually beneficial rivalry that is nourished by preconceived ideas and fuelled by clichés that have
taken hold because it’s convenient, not just for fans and media, but for the clubs themselves who are
happy for it to continue – it’s good for business and also because they operate in a world where
people need to create a sense of opposites in order to help affirm their own allegiances and identities.

It was frequently presented as a David and Goliath story throughout the previous century with
Barcelona relishing their status as underdogs, while Real Madrid were more than happy to play the
role of the big guy. But now they are two evenly matched Goliaths slugging it out, toe to toe, round
after round after round.
Just as the world of politics shows different ways of comprehending the world, the respective
styles of Barcelona and Real Madrid demonstrate two different ways of understanding the beautiful
game. Madrid has always been characterised by an energetic style of play, strong, fast and

competitive. Whereas Barcelona discovered, in the Dutch model, a valid alternative style to take on
Madrid: effective passing and offensive play.
‘That role of an antagonist fits in well in Spanish football, because Spain is always the red and
blue Spain, the peripheral and centralist, the Spain of Guardiola and Mourinho. That duality is
something that is received well by people. Mourinho has accentuated the division between the
different ways of seeing football that Barça and Madrid have. The interesting thing is the U-turn

Madrid has taken goes against their history, because Madrid has never entrusted the team to a coach’;
that’s how Alfredo Relaño, director of the sports daily AS, explains it.