Imagine they are a coach of the second English division. Imagine that your team is not marching too well, but they have managed to eliminate Liverpool in the fourth round of the FA Cup and chance has matched you in the next tie with Manchester City. Imagine that his words of admiration for Pep Guardiola in the previous meeting attract the attention of the coach ‘Citizen’ to the point of inviting them to spend 45 minutes with him in his office. This is the story of Miron Muslic.
Muslic trains the Plymouth Argyle, currently penultimate in the Championship, only one point above the last classified. The Bosnian coach arrived at the English team on January 12, from Cercle Brugge, after the dismissal of Wayne Rooney, Manchester United Legend. In the month and a half that leads to the team, he accumulates three victories, four draws and four losses.
Plymouth players applaud their fans after falling into the City of City.
The most important of the triumphs was in the fourth round of the FA Cup, eliminating Liverpool, leader of the Premier League. This allowed him to face Manchester City in the next round. Muslic showed his admiration for Pep Guardiola at the press conference prior to the confrontation: “He is a giant of our sport. He is one of the most successful coaches in football history. It is the greatest honor of my life, of my career as a coach, so I am looking forward to shaking hands and telling him that it is a model to follow for any coach of the world.”
A grateful Pep Guardiola
Guardiola responded to this gesture of admiration: “After these words, I have an incredible bottle of wine for him. I thank him very much and it will be an honor for me to meet him.” What the Manchester City coach did not know was that Miron Muslic, as is the case in the middle of the population of Bosnia, is Muslim, so he does not drink alcohol.
Muslic had already made public his consumption habits in the celebrations: after winning Liverpool in the previous Round of the FA Cup, he said he would celebrate it with a bottle of orange fanta and some nachos. Someone put Guardiola on notice, who, when greeting Muslic before the game that faced his teams, already made it clear what the plan was: “Miron, forget about wine. I know you don’t drink, but you have a prepared fanta.”
Guardiola, during the match between Manchester City and Plymouth.
During the meeting, however, Muslic was irreverent with his idol. The Plymouth Argyle got ahead in Etihad Stadium before the end of the first half, and Manchester City did not complete the comeback until the 76 An orange fanta for the bosnium … and a bottle of Italian red wine for your coaching staff.
About an hour at the PEP office
“We enjoyed the company and the hospitality of one of the best coaches in the history of sport. It was a wonderful experience,” Muslic said about the 45 minutes in which Guardiola received them in their office. “We are colleagues, although this man has basically won everything in the world of sport and I, nothing. The whole coaching staff was there and we spent a very nice time. When Pep speaks, you have to listen, and I think we all listen,” he continued.
Now, Muslic expects the relationship between the two to exceed the test of time, to be able to benefit both him and the players of his Plymouth. “Football is a very small world and relationships are very, very important. It is always easy to connect with good people, so maybe this can be beneficial for the future of Argyle,” he concluded.