Pep Guardiola claims that he only once doubted his footballing philosophy, which was in 2007, when he coached a Barca B team with Sergio Busquets and Pedro — and would find himself in the far flung outposts of Catalonia playing regional league football on small artificial pitches against agricultural players.
Barca B had been relegated to the fourth tier of Spanish football, their lowest ebb, and they won, drew and lost their first three fixtures under Guardiola.
His high-minded football looked naive and out of place in what was almost a non-league setting. He says that he thought about changing on the Sunday after the third game and by the Monday morning had talked himself out of it and banished any doubts.