PETER CROUCH believes Tony Pulis’ Stoke City were the only team in the world who could beat Pep Guardiola’s great Barcelona side at their absolute peak.
Because the Potters would have messed with Lionel Messi and his mates – whether it was a wet and windy Wednesday night in Stoke or not!
Guardiola led Barca to a club record 14 major honours in four years between 2008-2012 including two Champions’ League’s and two Fifa club world cup triumphs.
The Catalans’ 3-1 win over Sir Alex Ferguson’s Manchester United at Wembley in 2011 was considered to be one of the greatest club performances of all time.
But Crouch claims his former Potters’ boss Tony Pulis would have been more than a match for Guardiola – and would have devised a way to topple peak Pep and Messi in the Potteries!
In an interview for Joe Cole’s Cole Cast, the former England striker told the Chelsea legend: “The attitude and the camaraderie of the group he (Pulis) built was amazing.
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“It was one of the best dressing room’s I’ve ever been a part of.
“You just knew that you were going into battle every day and you were going to get a result because of the workrate, the attitude, the endeavour, the dedication.
“Honestly, we just made things difficult. I reckon at that time we were the only team who could have beaten Barcelona.
“We just made things horrible. If Messi and Iniesta came to the Britannia at that time I reckon we could have turned them over because we made it horrendous for teams.”
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Arsenal were the closest Premier League side in style to Barcelona and Crouch said Pulis used to love making life hell for Arsene Wenger, who famously dubbed Stoke a rugby team.
Crouchie confessed: “Arsenal was our home banker. We made things difficult.
“I remember we trained in the middle of the pitch before we played Arsenal on a Friday – just to cut it all up so they couldn’t play and the grass was grown longer.
“I remember looking at Aaron Ramsey and he couldn’t see his boots! He was like: ‘Crouchy?’ And I went: ‘It’s what we do here,’ it was brilliant.
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“But Tony’s best line of all time for me was when he felt that we were getting ahead of ourselves.
“This was one of the best lines I’ve ever heard in football, because he said: ‘Don’t get ahead of yourselves lads, you’re bang-average players in a fantastic system.’ You can’t argue with that!”
Source: Soccer - thesun.co.uk
