Guardiola's success no surprise for Kluivert

Josep Guardiola's promising start as FC Barcelona coach has come as no surprise to his former team-mate, Patrick Kluivert, who says the Catalan boss was already a manager on the pitch in his playing days.

Dugout destiny
Guardiola's first season in charge at the Camp Nou has seen Barcelona take a commanding lead at the top of the Liga and reach the UEFA Champions League semi-finals, where they face Chelsea FC. For Kluivert, who spent three seasons playing alongside him, Guardiola already seemed destined for a career in the dugout. "He was the captain when I was playing with him. You already saw that he was managing the team and always getting them talking to each other," Kluivert told uefa.com. "I'm not surprised that I see Pep at the moment as a very good trainer, and successful in his first year ... at the moment the results are perfect."

Football pleasure
Along with those results, Guardiola has brought a fluid, entertaining style to Barcelona's football which has won admirers across Europe, including Kluivert. "Every player, in each position, is just a pleasure on the eye. If you see the way they play, so relaxed, it's incredible." However, his admiration does not mean the Dutchman believes his old club will simply cruise to European football's greatest prize. Should they succeed against 2008 finalists Chelsea in the games on 28 April and 6 May, Barcelona would face either holders Manchester United FC or Arsenal FC, who they beat in the 2006 final, for the trophy in Rome on 27 May. Kluivert simply said: "It will be very difficult to win this year's Champions League."

Time flies
Now 32, Kluivert's playing career has also included spells with AC Milan, Newcastle United FC, Valencia CF, PSV Eindhoven and LOSC Lille Métropole; and it is not over yet. Though he has spent the past season as the strikers' coach at Louis van Gaal's newly-crowned Dutch champions AZ Alkmaar, the former Dutch international has not ruled out a revival of his playing career. He has particularly happy memories of a prolific spell in Catalonia between 1998 and 2004, during which he formed a strike partnership with Rivaldo that helped Barcelona retain their Liga title in 1999 under Van Gaal. "I think the six years went by very quickly," he said. "If you like a place, the time goes very fast. I love playing with great players and I played with very talented, very skilful players. I think the best time of my career, I played at Barcelona."

Ajax nostalgia
That said, Kluivert also has a big attachment to the club where he started out as a seven-year-old and for whom he went on to score the winner in the 1995 UEFA Champions League final – AFC Ajax. Kluivert, who also won Eredivisie titles with the Amsterdam side in 1995 and 1996, is aware of the struggles faced by his old club in recent seasons. Domestically, their last league title came in 2004 while their only UEFA Champions League final since 1995 was the following season, when Kluivert featured in a game in Rome they eventually lost to Juventus on penalties. "I think it's difficult for them to be among the big teams in Europe because the results are a little bit bad at the moment," he said. "Sure, it's hurting me because in my heart I really am an Ajax man. I grew at Ajax, it's always been the love of my life and it hurts me when people say that it's not the Ajax of 1995/96. But it's so difficult to have [that] again."