Chelsea’s Enzo Maresca claims he and Arsenal’s Mikel Arteta ‘have to be thankful’ for Pep Guardiola | OneFootball

Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola has received yet more of the ultimate praise from two of his leading challengers in the Premier League.

The Catalan coach is widely regarded as being one of the most transformational tacticians in the history of English football, having reinvented the way the game is perceived and played within the country following his arrival in 2016.

With the four-time successive Premier League champions insisting on a style that sees them control possession and build attacks from defence, Guardiola’s vision has been transferred across the game and is insisted upon at the very base of the sport, at grassroots level.

And beyond his time in England, whenever his career at Manchester City will come to a close, his legacy within the game will likely remain among the many coaches he has worked alongside who have now gone on to take leading roles at the top of the sport.

Among those are Enzo Maresca and Mikel Arteta, both of whom worked during some of Manchester City’s most successful campaigns since the Pep Guardiola era began in the summer of 2016, sitting in the role of assistant coach at the Etihad Stadium.

Speaking during a recent press conference, Chelsea boss Enzo Maresca revealed that Premier League title challengers Arsenal remain ‘the closest’ club to Manchester City in terms of battling for the top-flight crown.

“At this moment, Arsenal is the closest one to the best team in England that is Manchester City,” Maresca said around his side’s 1-1 draw against the Gunners at Stamford Bridge on Sunday evening.

Reflecting on his time working alongside Pep Guardiola at Manchester City in the role of assistant manager, Maresca said, “I learned many things from Pep. If I’m here today it’s probably because of the amount of things that I have been lucky to learn next to him.”

And the Italian coach believes that both himself and Arsenal’s Mikel Arteta – who was also a previous assistant to Guardiola at the Etihad Stadium – must be ‘thankful’ for the trust the Manchester City manager put in both men to lead on to success in their respective careers.

“Probably we [himself and Arteta] both have to be thankful because we worked besides and next to the one that I consider the best manager in the world,” Maresca admitted. “Probably we both have been quite lucky to work with Pep.”