Gary Neville has labelled Enzo Maresca’s job of succeeding Pep Guardiola at Manchester City as the “ultimate test” – because the club will accept “nothing less than winning” from the new manager.
Maresca faces the prospect of following on from one of the most successful managers in English football history, Guardiola, who won 20 major trophies, including six Premier League titles, during his 10-year spell at the Etihad Stadium.
The Italian is no stranger to those demands after spending a year as one of Guardiola’s assistants during City’s treble-winning season in 2022/23.
He is also no stranger to lifting silverware himself, after leading Chelsea to success in the Conference League and Club World Cup during his one full season in charge at Stamford Bridge – but he will face a whole different weight of expectation as he returns to the north west as a manager for the first time.
“Nothing less than winning is going to be accepted at Man City with what has gone on at the club over the last 10 years,” Neville told Sky Sports News.
“With the players and the squad they have at City, and the fact they won trophies last season, it’s going to put Maresca in a very different position to what he has been in before.
“Chelsea do have expectations to win but, right now, it is probably not at the same level as City. He knows the club and he is probably thinking it is the perfect moment in terms of his career.
“He’s obviously had a really good upbringing in terms of his coaching journey, but this is the ultimate task.”
Although Neville pulled no punches with his assessment of the job Maresca will be required to do, he did offer some optimism about the 46-year-old’s chances of succeeding given the rebuild already completed at Man City – fuelled by missing out on the Premier League trophy in back-to-back seasons for the first time in Guardiola’s tenure.
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“Towards the end of last season Man City were just starting to emerge with a new young team,” added Neville.
“The back four started to look like they’d pulled it together with Nunes, O’Reilly, Guehi and Khusanov and obviously they have some really good attacking players in Cherki, Semenyo and Doku in behind Haaland.
“If he can get the midfield right and get the buy-in from the squad, he’s got a great chance of doing something at City.
“We saw Arne Slot do an incredible job following Jurgen Klopp at Liverpool and going on to win a title in his first season.
“Obviously, it didn’t go well for him in the next season, but it’s obviously just a great challenge to follow the best that has ever done the job.”
Where do City still need to improve?
The imminent £116m addition of Elliot Anderson looks set to further enhance that City rebuild, with plans to sign another forward and the additional possibility of signing a right-back to provide competition to Matheus Nunes.
Neville thinks the club are right to put more work into getting back to the levels of their record-breaking points tallies of old.
He said: “The only other area City could strengthen is defence. It looks like they are okay at the top end of the pitch and Anderson is coming in to reinforce the midfield.
“Does he need one more midfielder and then more cover defensively for if there are injuries? That’s where I’d be looking at strengthening.
“Man City will score a bagful of goals whoever the coach is, but it’s about making sure they combine as a unit to suffer the endurance you have to go through to win a Premier League title.”
