From king to kingmaker? Why Guardiola v Arteta final signals changing of the guard

Mikel Arteta was Pep Guardiola ’s sidekick when the Manchester City manager was confronted with the question of the quadruple. “Almost impossible,” Guardiola said then. History would suggest he is correct but fast forward seven years and now Arsenal are the team who are still in contention to win the lot .

Is it possible? “For them, yeah,” said Guardiola. He has a different kind of vested interest now.

City are in three competitions, but increasingly it looks like they can only win two: they still have a Premier League meeting with Arsenal but, currently nine points behind Arteta’s team, it looks less like a title decider than it did. For Guardiola’s season to end with silverware, he will probably have to beat Arsenal: if not at the Etihad, at Wembley either in Sunday’s Carabao Cup final or, should he negotiate a last-eight meeting with Liverpool, in an FA Cup semi-final or final. Three years ago, Guardiola was only denied a quadruple by Nathan Jones, with a rare victory in his ill-fated time in charge of Southampton.

Now he could turn quadruple buster, like a king reduced to the role of kingmaker. Although, as Guardiola did note, he has won four trophies in a season, combining the Carabao and FA Cups with the Premier League and the Community Shield when assisted by Arteta in 2018-19. “A quadruple, domestic and not the [most] prestigious but we did,” he added.