Man City dominate 

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The unrivalled success of Pep Guardiola is such that he could retire tomorrow at the relatively young age of 53 years old and still go out as one of the most decorated managers of all time and arguably the most influential tactician to grace the beautiful game. A handful of greats could certainly rival the Spaniard once silverware is weighed and trophies are counted, but at this moment in time Guardiola sits top of most lists when it comes to naming the best managers in the history of the sport. 

Whether it be his meteoric rise at Barcelona, where Guardiola was promoted as a relatively unknown youth coach only to go on and win a remarkable three, consecutive LaLiga titles, two Spanish Cups and two Champions Leagues, his three years in Germany where he picked up no less than six trophies with Bayern Munich, or perhaps his eight years of almost unrivalled dominance of English football at Manchester City, Guardiola has unquestionably gone from strength to strength as a football manager. And along the way he’s spent a remarkable amount of money. 

Who are Pep Guardiola’s most expensive signings ever?

In a rather telling sign of how Guardiola’s career changed from one club to the next, only two of his top 20 most expensive signings ever actually came before he made the move to England in 2016. Not a single signing at Bayern makes the list, while David Villa’s €40 million move from Valencia to Barcelona in 2010 just scrapes in at no.19, while the notoriously failed attempt to turn Zlatan Ibrahimović into a Barca star in 2009 after signing him from Inter for €69.5m sits rather high at No.5. But, as we’ll find out, the rest of Guardiola’s top 20 all came thanks to the untold riches of his employers at the Etihad Stadium. 

As we can see, nine of Guardiola’s top 10 most expensive signings were players that joined him at Man City and many of them came about in the last few years. Players like Erling Haaland, Matheus Nunes, Josko Gvardiol and Rúben Dias are all players that have been added to the English goliath’s all-conquering machine. But, most interestingly, the one player that stands above all others is none other than Jack Grealish, who joined the club two years ago from Aston Villa for a remarkable fee of €117.5m. At the time, the England international’s move to Man City was a record fee paid by a Premier League club, before Enzo Fernández joined Chelsea for €121m one season later. 

Remarkably, despite spending unrivalled millions on transfer fees over the course of his career, Guardiola can lay claim to just two of the 50 most expensive signings ever and just two of the most expensive signings in Premier League history – both of which being the aforementioned Grealish transfer and Gvardiol’s €90m signing from RB Leipzig last summer. Which just goes to show that it isn’t often the most expensive signings that lead to the most success. Guardiola has spent a lot of money at each of his three clubs, but it has often been expertly applied to the right players at the right time. And is surely one of the reasons why he is arguably football’s greatest ever manager.