So Just How Great Was Guardiola?

If Pep Guardiola does leave Manchester City at the end of this season, he will do so with the shouts of him being one of the most successful and influential managers in Premier League history and certainly City have been the dominant force in the English game during his 10 seasons in charge with six Premier League titles, as well as FA Cups, League Cups and the Champions League which came at the cost of building the team for a tad under £2 billion.
For that outlay you would expect to be successful but it is the 115 charges of breaches of Premier League financial rules between 2009 and 2018 which cast a shadow over Guardiola's time in charge and the asterisk which is bound to be put beside the wins in the Footballing History Books.
An independent commission is yet to publish a ruling almost a year and a half after a disciplinary hearing concluded and with a year left on his contract, it is rumoured that he knows what is coming down the line and has jumped ship before it lands on the Manchester City doormat.
The punishment for failing to provide accurate financial information, failing to comply with Uefa's financial fair play (FFP) rules and breaches of Premier League's profitability and sustainability rules (PSR) as well as multiple charges that they failed to co-operate with the Premier League's investigation is going to be a very bitter pill to swallow, especially as Nottingham Forest and Everton suffered points deductions for 1 charge let alone 115.
The list also includes misreporting financial information with secret off-the-books payments to players and managers so City in wining so much, stand accused of subverting the Premier League rules that clubs had agreed to comply with as other clubs played by the rules while City spent more money on better players, and achieved their success.
If Manchester City are not on the end of unprecedented action than other clubs will join the fans in accusing the Premier League of a Whitewash, other managers have already cast aspersions on the Guardiola years with Jose Mourinho pointedly insisting he won his three Premier League titles with
Chelsea 'fairly and cleanly' and the La Liga president, Javier Tebas accusing City of 'financial doping' and the then-Liverpool manager, Jurgen Klopp, said City were in 'Fantasia land where they could buy whoever they wanted'.
Of course we will never know what Man City would have won if they hadn't been cheating and playing by their own rules but the asterisk beside Guardiola's achievements will, and should, taint his stewardship of the Citizens.