Pep Guardiola vs. Jose Mourinho.
For almost a decade, it was a rivalry that defined football: possession against anti-possession; beauty against expediency–or sanctimony against pragmatism depending which side of the line you stood; two men who, for two years in Spain, were part of perhaps the most bitter and compelling soap opera the sport has known. And yet when they meet on Sunday as Tottenham hosts Manchester City, there will be an inevitable sense of anti-climax. This isn’t the sport's biggest battle anymore.
On the one hand, that’s because Mourinho is now the manager of Tottenham Hotspur, whose wage bill is roughly 57% that of Man City.