Txiki Begiristain: “Pep took us – the Club – to the top level, the maximum you can get,”

Club executive Txiki spoke in glowing terms abvoyt Pep Guardiola as he secured the Catalan’s signature for an extended contract. Manchester City fans can breathe a sigh of relief as they will keep Pep in Manchester for another couple years.

Txiki spoke and said-

“It’s wonderful!” he said.

“When you do 100 points in the Premier League – such a difficult league – and then in the next one, you have to do 98 to beat an unbelievable team like Liverpool by one… You want to see every weekend and every year the same.

“You want to see that. It’s what anyone would like to see when you watch football – playing in the opponents’ half, winning the ball back immediately, creating chances, scoring goals, keeping clean sheets like we had last year.

“That kind of perfection – when you feel it, you want it every weekend.”

“Pep took us – the Club – to the top level, the maximum you can get,” he said.

“He has been important because we wanted to play attractive football and to win. He has done both extremely well. We have played unbelievable football and we have won.

“He’s a hard worker. Everybody wants to do well and be successful, but he is a hard worker.

“Everyone talks about the complexity of his tactics and that he’s always studying the opponent and his team - but it’s basically hours and hours of thinking and sharing with his staff.

“He spends a lot of hours here at this training centre, so the final product is on the pitch.”

“For me, something unbelievable was to do two seasons winning 198 points,” he said.

“I could see he could do it [win titles] but I could not expect such a big amount of points.

“I told him once when he was in Germany and we were talking: how difficult it is in the Premier League. You can win the league with 85, 86, 87 points… but to get 198, even I had thought it was impossible, but he did it.”

Big plaudits from the man in charge at City. Pep and Txiki have made a good tandem.