He won a trio of Bundesliga titles with Bayern but suffered three consecutive semi-final defeats in the Champions League, to Real Madrid, Barca and Atletico Madrid.
Similarly, he has enjoyed huge domestic success with Manchester City, winning two Premier League titles, one FA Cup and three EFL Cups, but he is yet to guide them beyond the quarter-finals in Europe.
Magath has called Guardiola’s possession-based system into question, suggesting it worked at Barca “solely because of Lionel Messi, who can decide a game out of nowhere”.
“Messi won the titles, not Guardiola,” he told Sport Bild. “Without Messi, this system has never worked as successfully for Guardiola, otherwise he would have won the Champions League with Bayern or Manchester City long ago.
“Tiki-taka only works if you have players who are technically superior to their opponents. For the spectator, holding the ball, as I call it, is just boring and a top team doesn’t really need it.