Man City academy agree with Lionel Messi's comments on Pep Guardiola 'confusion'

Ever since they came together to change football at Barcelona, there has been a race to try to replicate the success that Pep Guardiola and Lionel Messi have enjoyed.

Messi is an idol for millions of boys and girls who grow up dreaming of being able to play like the Argentina superstar, while Guardiola's methods have filtered down to grassroots level as the ideas around ball-playing defenders and possession football have become more popular.

Boston Celtics coach Joe Mazzulla recently credited Guardiola for his help in thinking about transitions as they clinched the NBA Championship, showing an influence that has spread beyond football.

However, it is not always useful when people try and imitate the success. Guardiola has regularly warned about the dangers of 'copy and paste' just because there appears to be a winning formula, and now Messi has spoken of the 'confusion' that can harm the development of young players by trying to over-coach them.

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"The Guardiola era has caused a bit of confusion. Everyone wants to play like that now," the forward said. "They tell six, seven-year-olds to play with two touches, quickly. At that age, what happened with me needs to happen for these kids... we shouldn’t take away their spontaneity."

Those comments could be used to suggest Guardiola's style is not helpful for developing the next Messi, but only if Manchester City's academy coaches are trying to impose his thinking on the youngest kids in the academy. Thankfully, thanks not the case.

"At foundation phase, it's about game understanding," academy director Thomas Krucken told MEN Sport. last month. "Let the lead coach be the mentor of the kids to explain something to the team members.

"Let the game understanding be there and the next step is decision making but before you have to understand the game. let them grow where they are allowed to do mistakes. Mistakes are a big opportunity for us to develop."

The development of players that will fit into the Guardiola mould still begins early at City, but the start of every journey is simply letting them learn about the game in their own way. There is all the time in the world to coach tactics and philosophy, but City are intent on not coaching the spontaneity out of youngsters starting off in the academy.

It may not be enough to create the next Messi because there are only so many generational talents in the game – but it will at least help City to avoid the 'confusion' that others have fallen into in an attempt to catch up with two of the greatest figures in world football.