'Take the Ball, Pass the Ball' captures Barcelona's Pep Guardiola years

A documentary on the greatest football team of our times escapes banality by reprising the genius of its coach and the unparalleled skills of its players

It takes a lot to deflate Alex Ferguson. And by a lot, I mean a lot. He is, after all, one of the great figures of the modern game, the most successful coach in the history of British football, and a figure revered widely in all of sport. Yet, in the pressroom at London’s Wembley Stadium on May 29, 2011, the seemingly unflappable Scotsman cut a wretched figure. “Well, they really mesmerise you with their passing, and we never really controlled [Lionel] Messi.” A sense of defeatism filled the room. These were a fatalistic set of words you would have scarcely expected from a proud and seasoned winner like Ferguson.

Don’t blame Ferguson. Pep Guardiola’s Barcelona made you feel like that. They passed and passed and sucked all life out of you. And if you somehow miraculously got hold of the ball, they descended on you like a swarm of bees and took it right off you. Ferguson further spoke about Manchester United’s preparation ahead of the Champions League final that year and how everything had gone smoothly. That was the other thing about Barcelona in those days: no amount of training quite readied you for the enormity of what was in store. At Wembley, Barcelona passed well into the night, until United were sapped of all their energy and self-belief. And they did this to a team playing its third Champions League final in four years. This wasn’t merely football — this was some otherworldly, quasi-religious experience that transcended sport. 

In 2012, football writer Graham Hunter revealed the story behind Barcelona’s astounding dominance during the period — 14 trophies in four years, a club record — in his book, Barça: The Making of the Greatest Team in the World. Now, that book has been made into a film, Take the Ball, Pass the Ball, the title an apt homage to the philosophy that seduced football watchers all across the world. The story here is told by the men who lived it: Messi, Xavi, Andrés Iniesta, Thierry Henry, Gerard Piqué, Dani Alves, Sergio Busquets and, of course, Guardiola himself.

The film is as much a tribute to Guardiola as it is to Johan Cruyff (above). The Dutchman, of course, laid the foundation of the Barcelona that we see today, a group of twinkle-toed artists executing a demanding, high-risk style of football. Photo: Reuters

The Wembley triumph was arguably Guardiola’s finest hour and the film predictably takes off from there. The ripping apart of Manchester United was a frightening exhibition of what a bunch of 11 players, when steered by a crazy manager and an all-consuming ideology, can achieve on a football pitch. If the Champions League win against the same opposition in Rome two years previously was an introduction to Guardiola’s radical football methods, the Wembley conquest was his coronation as the emperor of the game’s neo-tactical age. As Alves, putting forth a car analogy, explains somewhere in the middle of the film, “if Johan Cruyff was Mach I, then Guardiola is Mach II.”

As delightful as it is, Take the Ball, Pass the Ball, directed by Duncan McMath, seldom offers anything new. Barcelona and Guardiola have acted as muses for several writers over the years and, by now, there is very little that we do not know about them. Yet, it is strangely exhilarating to hear, even in this age of over-exposure, players talk about Guardiola’s ways and what made them so devastatingly effective. Like Xavi, who is sat in his living room, explaining with drinking glasses in hand, how they exploited United’s weaknesses in midfield; or Henry, who is shown claiming that “if you love football and you don’t love Barcelona, then you have a problem”.

Guardiola (right) with Lionel Messi. The former’s tactical nous and intense man-management come through wonderfully in the film. Photo: Reuters

Messi running circles around defenders may be a dominant theme, but Guardiola is the undisputed star of the show. The Spaniard, who is now manager at Manchester City, may have unexpectedly succumbed to Maurizio Sarri’s Chelsea last week for his first defeat of the season, but he continues to be the patent-holder of the blueprint that teams and managers would kill to replicate. His tactical nous and intense man-management come through wonderfully in the film. The players love this guy and they just can’t show it enough.

Messi running circles around defenders may be a dominant theme, but Guardiola is the undisputed star of the show

That does, though, beg the question of Guardiola’s authoritarian streak. In his autobiography, Zlatan Ibrahimovic, who briefly played under Guardiola, writes about how the Barcelona players were like a bunch of schoolboys who always listened to their manager with their heads bowed. So when Alves, for instance, talks about jumping off the stadium roof if Guardiola told him to, you know exactly what Ibrahimovic is talking about. That is perhaps why all the veneration — superbly deserved though it may be — does feel a little nauseating in the film.

Moreover, Guardiola has been accused of feeling threatened by strong characters in the past. He seems the kind of guy who always wants to be in control, doubling up as his side’s chief cheerleader and showman. Without him on the touchline, his teams lack the bite and leadership that Guardiola supplies in plenty. It is little surprise then that City’s biggest loss last season, against Liverpool in the Champions League, arrived when Guardiola had been sent to the stands.

The film is as much a tribute to Guardiola as it is to Cruyff. The Dutchman, of course, laid the foundation of the Barcelona that we see today, a group of twinkle-toed artists executing a demanding, high-risk style of football that sometimes seems too good to be real. Also thrown in is a fiery sequence involving Guardiola and his great rival, Jose Mourinho. The segment “Road to Wembley” is an entertaining compilation of the jibes and animosity between the two. Guardiola had the last laugh, of course; his imperious Barcelona team marmalised Mourinho’s Real Madrid 5-0 in November 2010. In other parts, Henry deserves special mention merely for his strikingly good articulation, and Samuel Eto’o is likeable for his questioning — mild though it may have been — of Guardiola’s approach. 

Football documentaries tend to be banal and Take the Ball, Pass the Ball is not the greatest aberration in that sense. It may also seem like a stupendous highlights reel in some places, but there is little denying that it is a very enjoyable film. It’s a two-hour-long celebration of everything Barcelona: the culture, the tradition, the philosophy and all that makes them “more than a club”. 

Take the Ball, Pass the Ball is available on DVD at www.amazon.co.uk