Stoke’s Shaqiri has no issue with City boss Guardiola

Xherdan Shaqiri bears no grudge towards Pep Guardiola and respects his coaching style, despite the Catalan coach casting him aside at Bayern Munich.

Stoke’s Shaqiri was signed for Bayern by Jupp Heynckes and won the treble but found himself featuring less regularly after Guardiola arrived.

Guardiola soon began restructuring and the Swiss international eventually joined Inter Milan before signing with Stoke.

And the midfielder denied he had any issues with the Spanish coach’s methods, insisting he thoroughly enjoyed the Bayern training sessions under his stewardship.

“My situation changed under Pep Guardiola, but I never had any problems with him,” said Shaqiri.

“Unfortunately, I had some injury problems. But I got unhappy because I played a lot of games before and had my say in the treble season.

(Photo by sampics/Corbis via Getty Images)

“But then players came from the bench before me even though they had a lower standing within the team.

“This was disappointing of course, though I’d say I never feared competition and wanted to show the coach why he was wrong.

“His (Guardiola’s) training was special, detailed and pretty demanding – but absolutely ace. We did everything with the ball.

“With Heynckes during preparation, we would run like scared rabbits three times a day. But that was so everyone was 100 percent fit.”