The best and worst combined XIs ever managed by Poch and Pep

Pep Guardiola faces Mauricio Pochettino in a Champions League semi-final. Both have managed some incredible players. And others not so good.

Before Paris Saint-Germain host Manchester City on Wednesday, we figured it would be fun to compile the best and worst XIs that have ever played under either manager. Some ludicrous stars miss out.

To prevent the former being Barcelona 2008/09 and the latter being Tottenham 2014/15, a simple rule: there can only be a maximum of two players from any one of their seven cumulative clubs in each side.

The best

Carlos Kameni 83 games under Pochettino at Espanyol

Everyone: your pick for a goalkeeper in a combined team of those who have ever played under either Pep Guardiola or Mauricio Pochettino is not Manuel Neuer, Victor Valdes, Hugo Lloris or Joe Hart but La Liga mainstay Carlos Kameni?

Me, an intellectual: Activate his £8m release clause on FM08 and win everything. Also have some respect for a 2000 Summer Olympics, 2002 Africa Cup of Nations and 2006 Copa del Rey champion. Also that maximum of two players per club rule is unnecessarily restrictive but we’re here now so let’s make peace with it and move on before someone forces me to think of another content idea at gunpoint.

Toby Alderweireld 172 games under Pochettino at Southampton and Tottenham

It was at Southampton that Pochettino first encountered Toby Alderweireld, bringing him in on a season-long loan from Atletico Madrid. The Belgian had ended the previous campaign playing in a Champions League final but soon found himself competing for a place with Maya Yoshida. He subsequently followed his manager to Tottenham and remained until fairly recently one of the leading centre-halves in the entire Premier League, adding a second European Cup runners-up medal to his collection in 2019.

Carles Puyol 164 games under Guardiola at Barcelona

“His track record speaks for itself. He’s been the captain and an example for the rest. He was always the first to run and get to training, first in everything. He helped me a lot throughout my career. Normally, when we speak about talent, we speak about offensive players, but he showed defensive talent. He looked like he enjoyed defending. He was a very intelligent player, one of the greatest in the history of Barcelona.”

Cheers, Pep.

Marquinhos 18 games under Pochettino at PSG

Six players have made more appearances for PSG in the club’s entire history than Marquinhos (315); he is 26 and should rise to third on that list (344) by the middle of next season after forming a crucial part of Pochettino’s new era as captain. Daft, really.

Fernandinho 206 games under Guardiola at Manchester City

Having just turned 31 when Guardiola was appointed at Manchester City, few would have expected Fernandinho to still form an integral part of the side half a decade on. The midfielder is four months younger than Pablo Zabaleta and six months older than Aleksandar Kolarov, both of whom the Spaniard also inherited. But crucially they were not very good, at least in comparison to one of only two men to start all four of Guardiola’s League Cup wins. And there is simply no room for Kyle Walker.

Toni Kroos 51 games under Guardiola at Bayern Munich

One season of Kroos and Guardiola together at Bayern Munich seems like a cruel joke when you consider we got two and a half of Jose Mourinho gaslighting Luke Shaw. What could have been. The midfielder increased his Bundesliga and DFB-Pokal collections and promptly left for Real Madrid after being on the wrong end of a 5-0 Champions League semi-final aggregate thrashing.

Lionel Messi 219 games under Guardiola at Barcelona

Yes.

Harry Kane 242 games under Pochettino at Tottenham

Also yes.

Neymar 12 games under Pochettino at PSG

Like gilded ships passing in the glistening night, Guardiola left Barcelona in June 2012 and Neymar arrived at the Nou Camp less than a year later. Fate has never transpired to unite them. But Pochettino has welcomed the opportunity to work with the “humble” and “special” Brazilian, who returned the niceties by scoring the winning goal that secured the coach his first piece of silverware ever as a manager in January.

Robert Lewandowski 100 games under Guardiola at Bayern Munich

One would assume Guardiola had seen it all at this stage. That only became the case specifically in September 2015. In two seasons working with the Spaniard at Bayern he scored 67 goals in 100 games because really why not?

Sergio Aguero 177 games under Guardiola at Manchester City

It was Samuel Eto’o at Barcelona; he was sold by the end of the season. But the scorers of the first goals under Guardiola at Bayern (Arjen Robben) and Manchester City (Aguero) were suitably symbolic. It is bizarre to think that at one point Aguero and Guardiola were deemed completely incompatible, particularly as they have won seven trophies together and only Messi has ever scored more goals for the Spaniard.

The worst

Claudio Bravo 61 games under Guardiola at Manchester City

The first battle Guardiola lost in the process of winning many a war at Manchester City was in signing Bravo for £17m to replace Joe Hart. After a number of high-profile mistakes the Chilean lost his starting place to Willy Caballero and ended the season with a Premier League save percentage of 56.7%. Bravo kept five clean sheets in 17 games for the club last campaign and left for Real Betis in August, keeping Real Madrid at bay on Saturday.

Kevin Wimmer 31 games under Pochettino at Tottenham

Still contracted to Stoke despite not playing for them since January 2018. Has another year left on that deal. Tottenham extracting £18m for a centre-half they signed at £4.3m two nondescript seasons prior was witchcraft. Pochettino presumably used the money to buy more vibe lemons.

Dmytro Chygrynskiy 14 games under Guardiola at Barcelona

Known as ‘CTRL + C, CTRL + V’ by his closest friends, Chygrynskiy is often mentioned when ordinary discussions inevitably turn to Guardiola’s worst ever signings. He joined Barcelona for £21.4m in August 2009 and was sold back to Shakhtar Donetsk for £12.4m 11 months later after making just 14 appearances in a 59-game season across six different competitions.

Jan Kirchhoff 12 games under Guardiola at Bayern Munich

The Guardiola-Allardyce Venn diagram is surely not all that substantial but Kirchhoff would sit snugly in the centre. He played the last of his 145 minutes under the former in December 2015 before joining the latter on loan the following month to help stave off Premier League relegation.

Thievy Bifouma 25 games under Pochettino at Espanyol

It certainly is the scorer of two Premier League goals under Pepe Mel. It is also the scorer of one goal in three bit-part seasons under Pochettino in Spain. Two sides of the same slightly rubbish coin.

Benjamin Stambouli 25 games under Pochettino at Tottenham

Has anyone worked out what a Benjamin Stambouli does yet?

Ibrahim Afellay 33 games under Guardiola at Barcelona

Perhaps things would have turned out different if Afellay hadn’t suffered an anterior cruciate knee ligament injury in September of Guardiola’s final Barcelona season. Not that the Dutchman was on a track destined for brilliance, being used mainly as a rotational option after joining from PSV in January 2011. He picked up a La Liga winner’s medal as starts were handed out in preparation for the merciless Champions League final, which Afellay played the last minute of as a substitute after Wayne Rooney begged for mercy.

Nolito 35 games under Guardiola at Manchester City

Such a strange season, that first of Guardiola at the Etihad. Jesus Navas, Gael Clichy, Bacary Sagna, Fernando and Kelechi Iheanacho all made more than 20 appearances. Nolito racked up 30 and finished level on goals with fellow club legends Kevin de Bruyne and Yaya Toure. One season was all he could endure before heading back to Spain for the sake of his daughter’s pigmentation.

Guly do Prado 17 games under Pochettino at Southampton

It feels a little harsh to dig out a squad player from Southampton 2010/11 League One promotion campaign but them’s the breaks and Guly do Prado was inevitably short of the requisite standard when Pochettino took the reins in January 2013. The Brazilian was in his 30s and already slowing down, although he did manage a goal in the FA Cup against Yeovil Town.

Emmanuel Mayuka Five games under Pochettino at Southampton

Mayuka was similarly ill-suited to the task at hand, his four Premier League appearances for Pochettino at Saints coming as substitute in two draws and a pair of defeats. He did also score against lower-league opposition in a domestic cup: Barnsley in the Capital One.

Ben Sahar 24 games under Pochettino at Espanyol

Rounding off a strikeforce roughly as lethal as Chelsea’s is former Blue Sahar, who left Stamford Bridge in 2009 to join Espanyol during Pochettino’s first year as a manager. The forward scored twice in a pre-season friendly against Liverpool but only ever managed one competitive goal before being sent out on a couple of loans.