• Coach to leave at end of the season
• Won three titles and two Champions Leagues since 2008
Pep Guardiola is set to announce he is quitting Barcelona at a press conference this lunchtime. He informed his squad at Friday's training session that he will be leaving the club at the end of the season. According to reports from Spain Guardiola, who is out of contract at the end of the season, is understood to have told the club president, Sandro Rosell, of his decision on Thursday that he did not wish to sign a new one and will leave after the Copa del Rey final.
The 41-year-old manager has led Barcelona to 13 trophies since taking over at the beginning of the 2008-09 season, including two Champions Leagues and three Spanish league titles.
Guardiola has preferred to sign only one-year contracts for each of the previous two seasons and the delay in agreeing to renew for next season has suggested for the past few weeks that he was unlikely to stay.
During the past week, Barcelona were knocked out of the Champions League at the semi-final stage by Chelsea and suffered a home defeat by Real Madrid that will almost certainly cost them the Spanish title.
Guardiola stepped up from Barca B manager to the first-team in 2008 and has gone on to become the most successful coach in the club's history. But the setback against Chelsea came only 72 hours after Barça's hopes of retaining their league title were dashed following a 2-1 defeat at home to arch rivals Real Madrid. That loss left them seven points behind José Mourinho's men with four games remaining.
Guardiola led Barça to the Primera Division title in his first season in charge after masterminding a squad overhaul which saw the likes of Ronaldinho and Deco sold and a greater emphasis placed on youth.
The results were immediate. Not only did Barça win the league – the highlight being a 6-2 thrashing of Madrid at the Bernabéu – but they also claimed the Copa del Rey and Champions League.
The 2009-10 campaign began with further success in the Spanish Super Cup, Uefa Super Cup and Fifa World Club Cup as Barça became the first club side to win six major trophies in one calendar year. They failed to defend their Champions League crown after being eliminated by Mourinho-led Internazionale at the semi-final stage but retained their league title with a record points total of 99.
With Madrid recruiting Mourinho in a bid to end Barcelona's run of success, the 2010-11 season was supposed to pose new challenges for Guardiola. But the former Spain midfielder, having signed David Villa to replace Zlatan Ibrahimovic, guided Barça to the league title once more and they backed that up by winning the Champions League again by defeating Manchester United at Wembley.
Cesc Fábregas joined from Arsenal in the summer of 2011 as Guardiola again placed his faith in products of the La Masia academy and while the free-flowing football remained, long winning runs were punctuated with surprise defeats.
The Spanish Super Cup and Uefa Super Cup were won, as was the Fifa Club World Cup, but league setbacks against Getafe and Osasuna undermined their title challenge.
Barça have qualified for the final of the Copa del Rey next month in which they will meet Athletic Bilbao in what is set to be Guardiola's final game in charge.
Speculation has begun over his potential successor with Ernesto Valverde, Marcelo Bielsa and Laurent Blanc all thought to be in the frame.
As for Guardiola, he is expected to take a sabbatical from the game despite being linked with numerous jobs across Europe. Read More
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