According to recent reports, Pep Guardiola believes that Xavi Hernandez will be the perfect manager for Barcelona. While Xavi has not officially been announced as the next Catalan manager yet, it is widely believed and accepted that the former legend is going to be their next coach. After the departure of Ronald Koeman, the B team coach, Sergi Barjuan, took the role of the caretaker or the interim manager. While there are a lot of options currently open for Barca, such as Antonio Conte, Joachim Low, Frank Lampard, etc, there is no man suited for the job better than Xavi.
Hernandez is a Barcelona man through and through and he knows the club in and out. He is used to the environment, comfortable with management, and has been managing the Qatari team, Al Sadd for almost three years now. In the first season, he could not win the league title; however, he only lost five matches. In his second season, he managed to win the league and did so perfectly with no losses, this season as well, he has no losses and is currently sitting at the top of the table. His managerial style is very similar to Guardiola himself and thus, it is not hard to see why the former Barca coach backs Xavi. In a pre-match interview against Crystal Palace, the Spaniard said,
"“Xavi, if it happens, I don’t have any doubts that he’s ready to do the job. He knows the environment which is so important. He knows the game, he has passion. He has more experience now than I had when I took over. If Xavi is the next manager, I wish him all the best and hopefully step by step the team can come back.”Source Goal"
Guardiola then went on to talk about the sacked manager, Koeman, and said that he felt bad for the Dutch manager because he had to manage the club at a very difficult time. He said that he wishes all the best for Koeman in the future however, every manager knows that results are what matters and at the end of the day if you do not have the results, your job is not secured.
Can Xavi be as successful as Guardiola at Barcelona?