This Pep Guardiola story from a new Barcelona book is brilliant 😂 | OneFootball

Anyone who knows anything about football knows Pep Guardiola is a pretty intense guy.

A student from the Johan Cruyff school of football, Guardiola is one of most brilliant and successful managers of all-time and whether he’s on the training ground with his players or refereeing a kids’ match, the Catalan never stops coaching.

An excerpt from Simon Kuper’s new book The Barcelona Complex gives a brilliant insight into just what a coaching obsessive Guardiola can be.

“Around 2013, a kids’ indoor soccer tournament in Rockville Centre, New York, found itself a referee short,” writes Kuper.

“One of the organisers asked the parents: Does anyone know the rules well enough to call a game? A Hispanic-looking man in a baseball cap volunteered.

“But he turned out to interpret his role rather broadly. He kept stopping the game to advise both teams on positioning. The watching parents, who had come to see their kids win, grew antsy. ‘Come on! Let them play!’ they shouted.

“The guy in the baseball cap, on sabbatical in New York after four draining seasons at Barça, was Pep Guardiola.”

Of course it was.

Too intense or the mark of a genius? We’ll leave that for you to decide.