Pep Guardiola is putting together a new coaching team for the coming season. Three assistants are leaving Manchester City.
Although he signed a new contract until 2027 last fall in the midst of a sporting crisis, there have been rumors about Pep Guardiola’s future throughout the past season. Most recently, Manchester City’s head coach even openly threatened to resign. He hardly meant it seriously, however, as he has long been planning for the new season, in which the dethroned Skyblues want to strike back – with a new coaching team, among other things.
On Wednesday, ManCity officially announced what had already been hinted at: Guardiola’s three most important assistants are leaving the club: the two assistant coaches Juanma Lillo and Inigo Dominguez, as well as Carlos Vicens, who was responsible for set pieces, among other things. Successors for the trio have not yet been named.
Lillo has been a close companion to Guardiola in recent years. The 59-year-old Spaniard coached Mexican club Dorados de Sinaloa when Guardiola ended his professional career there in 2005/06 and was most recently the Catalan’s assistant coach for the second time.
Vicens becomes head coach at Sporting Braga
Lillo first joined ManCity in the summer of 2020 and returned to the newly crowned treble winners in 2023 after a spell in Qatar in 2022, where he took over champions Al-Sadd a few months before the World Cup. According to ManCity, Lillo is now returning to his native Spain.
The 46-year-old Dominguez, also Spanish, followed Lillo to Qatar as assistant coach in 2022 before joining ManCity in 2023. Dominguez had already worked alongside Lillo at Real Sociedad, UD Almeria, Millonarios Bogota, Atletico Nacional, and Vissel Kobe. The future of the two is still uncertain – unlike that of Vicens: The 42-year-old Spaniard, who had been part of Guardiola’s team since 2021, will take over as head coach at Sporting Braga, which finished the season in fourth place in Portugal.