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Pep Guardiola has an opportunity to make football history on Saturday, and the only team standing in his way is Inter. What could go wrong? Well, based on the last time the Catalan coach faced the Nerazzurri, pretty much everything.When Guardiola’s Barcelona met Inter in the 2009-10 Champions League semi-finals, the Catalan was on course to become the first coach to win the competition in successive seasons. The clash against Jose Mourinho, his old colleague at Camp Nou but by then bitter enemy, was laced with narratives from the start, and turned out to be a truly epic encounter.In the end, a volcanic eruption, transport problems, uncut grass and questionable refereeing decisions all played their part in Barca and Guardiola missing out on the final in what proved to be the only season he didn't win the Champions League as coach at Camp Nou.<script type="application/json" data-placement="fcplayer-semantic">{"type":"fcplayer-semantic","data":{"embedCode":"//cdn.fcp.codes/embed-code-template/embed-code-template.js#SEMANTIC_5704afb8-c10b-4ba5-9cb4-d7fb6098ef90"}}</script>And so as Guardiola prepares to face Inter for the first time in 13 years while aiming to complete the treble with Manchester City, GOAL relives one of the most memorable ties in the competition’s history...

Volcanos, sprinklers, a 14-hour coach journey and how Jose Mourinho's Inter took down Pep Guardiola's all-conquering Barcelona

Guardiola and Mourinho’s rivalry gripped European football for the best part of a decade, beginning with this unforgettable tie, with the heat being turned up even more when they were on opposite sides of the Real Madrid and Barcelona divide between 2010 and 2013. The hostility continued for two-and-a-half years in Manchester, although Guardiola was unmistakably the winner in the end.The story began long before in 1996, when Mourinho was hired as an assistant to then Barcelona coach Bobby Robson and Guardiola was Barca captain. Robson recalled the pair as being “very friendly” and they enjoyed an emotional embrace on the pitch when Barca won the European Cup Winners Cup in 1997.The feeling of mutual respect disappeared 11 years later, though, when Mourinho was interviewed to become Barcelona coach. Despite winning numerous trophies with Porto and Chelsea, he was turned down in favour of Guardiola, whose only experience as a coach was with Barca’s B team. That inevitably hurt Mourinho’s pride, or in the words of Barcelona director Marc Ingla: “Mourinho was a bit poisoned by the fact that he was rejected.”As such, when Mourinho and Guardiola met for the first time as adversaries in the 2009-10 Champions League group stages, Guardiola had taken the Portuguese’s crown as the best manager in Europe after leading Barca to the treble in his first season in charge.Mourinho, meanwhile, had already rubbed Barca fans up the wrong way during his time with Chelsea, including accusing Guardiola's predecessor, Frank Rijkaard, of entering the referees’ dressing room, and saying that Lionel Messi had dived around because people from Barcelona liked going to the theatre.As Barca beat Inter 2-0 at Camp Nou, the Catalans taunted Mourinho by chanting “go to the theatre”. The perfect storm was brewing for the next time the two teams would meet.

Mourinho v Guardiola: Friends to sworn enemies

As well as sparking an explosive rivalry between Guardiola and Mourinho, the semi-final tie was defined by a very real eruption. The Eyjafjallajokull volcano in Iceland had erupted one month earlier, causing travel chaos all over Europe as the ash cloud it spewed into the air halted air travel across the continent.Six months earlier, Barcelona had flown to Milan in just an hour, but now they had little choice but to make the 1000km journey by bus. They set off for the first leg at the San Siro two days before kick-off, having played a crucial match against Espanyol the previous night.Barca broke the journey up with a night stay in Cannes and were travelling on a luxury coach, but Guardiola, who had prioritised shorter journeys to limit the impact of travel on his players, did not hide his frustration at the turn of events.“It is not the ideal thing, after you have played a league game, to travel for 14 hours to play a Champions League semi-final against a strong team,” he said. “It is not ideal. But the problem is a volcano and there is nothing we can do.”Zlatan Ibrahimovic, who had moved to Barca from Inter the previous summer, was less diplomatic “Some brain-dead person at Barca thought that was a good idea,” the Swede wrote in his autobiography. "But the trip became a disaster. It took 14 hours and we were all worn out when we arrived in Milan.”

Barca on the bus after Icelandic eruption

While Barca were Champions League holders and aiming to win the trophy for the third time in five years, Inter were bidding for their first final in 38 years, and there was a feverish atmosphere at San Siro. The stadium’s ground staff, perhaps influenced by Mourinho, had kept the grass long and dry in an attempt to stifle Barca’s short-passing style.Barcelona took the lead through Pedro but Wesley Sneijder equalised before half-time, before Maicon and Gabriel Milito struck in the second half to give Inter a 3-1 win and the perfect advantage for the second leg.Barca felt hard done by, though. Milito was in an offside position when he scored, and in modern times the goal would definitely have been ruled out by VAR. The Catalans also felt they should have had a penalty when Sneijder slid in on Dani Alves.Xavi Hernandez argued with Mourinho at full-time while Guardiola protested that Inter had kept pulling Messi’s shirt. He also complained about the state of the pitch, promising after the game: "In Barcelona, we will attack. We will put water on the pitch so the ball moves quicker, which they didn’t do here.”Mourinho, in his usual cunning style, twisted the knife in after the game. “It’s normal they get angry losing, because they’re not used to it," he said. "You can’t win it all. It’s not easy to accept it, but that’s football.”

'They're not used to losing'

Barca were missing two key men for the second leg, with captain Carles Puyol suspended and Andres Iniesta injured. Mourinho, meanwhile, continued the mind games the night before the game. He said his team were motivated by the “dream” of making the final while Barcelona were “obsessed” with the thought of winning the Champions League at Santiago Bernabeu, the home of Real Madrid.Thiago Motta, a former Barca player, followed Mourinho's lead in the press conference. “We are used to seeing them throw themselves to the floor," he said. Guardiola, however, sought to play down the rivalry, insisting he had “a very good relationship” with Mourinho.Motta's words rang true early on at Camp Nou when he struck Sergio Busquets and the Barca midfielder rolled to the floor clutching his face, before then lifting his hand away from his eye to see whether the referee had seen it. Motta, who had already been booked, was shown a straight red card, leaving Inter with over an hour to play with 10 men. Mourinho wildly gesticulated on the sideline, but the decision only made his side more determined.The Nerazzurri engaged in extreme time wasting and tactical fouls, with four more players earning bookings. They managed to contain Barca until Gerard Pique scored in the 84th minute. One more goal would have sent the Catalans through on away goals and they thought they had found it when Bojan Krkic scored, but it was ruled out for an earlier handball.

Motta red spurs Inter on

When the full-time whistle came, Inter’s staff and substitutes, led by Mourinho, stormed the pitch to celebrate their passage to the final. Mourinho was goading the home fans and Barca goalkeeper Victor Valdes ran over to tell him to stop. In the end, Barca’s ground staff intervened by turning on the sprinklers, but even the prospect of getting soaked did not deter Inter’s jubilant players.Mourinho, who had won the Champions League and multiple league titles by then, called it “the greatest moment of my career” and described his side “as a team of heroes”. He then went to the chapel inside Camp Nou to give thanks.Barca's players were inconsolable. Forward Pedro later told The Independent: “I don’t know how we lost. It was one of my worst days as a Barca player.”The elimination was extra painful for Guardiola, who had sold Samuel Eto'o to Inter as part of the deal to sign Ibrahimovic. The Swede had contributed very little in either game, while Eto'o worked his socks off to resist Barca. Guardiola kept his cool after the game, however. “We lost to a great team and a great coach," he said. "We will be back."

Mourinho dances through the sprinklers

True to his word, 12 months later Guardiola's Barca knocked out Mourinho’s Real Madrid in the Champions League semi-finals and went on to outclass Manchester United in the final. It remains as the last time he lifted the famous trophy.Mourinho led Madrid to win La Liga the following season, and the rivalry with Barcelona descended into violence when he poked Guardiola's assistant coach, Tito Vilanova, in the eye during a Spanish Super Cup game.Guardiola only met Mourinho once while coach of Bayern, winning the UEFA Super Cup against Chelsea, but he went on to win the war with the Portuguese in Manchester, racing to the 2017-18 title with City while finishing 19 points ahead of United. A few months later, Mourinho was sacked.But Guardiola has not faced Inter since the explosive tie of 2010. And even after his City side outclassed Real Madrid 4-0 last month to set-up the 2023 final with the Nerazzurri, Guardiola had not forgotten what had happened 13 years ago. "A final against an Italian team is always not the best gift, honestly," he said.The coach has the chance to write that wrong against Inter on Saturday at the Ataturk Olympic Stadium. Thankfully for him, this time he will not be facing Mourinho. Or a volcano.

Pep loses the battle, but wins the war

Volcanos, sprinklers, a 14-hour coach journey and how Jose Mourinho's Inter took down Pep Guardiola's all-conquering Barcelona | Goal.com

In the Champions League final, Pep Guardiola will be facing Inter for the first time since an epic semi-final clash with Barcelona against Jose Mourinho&apos;s treble-winning side in 2010