Guardiola's Apology

English football only began to truly take the effects of alcohol seriously after Wenger took charge of Arsenal.

Wenger carried out a series of sweeping reforms at the Gunners, with changing the players' eating habits as a key focus. He placed particular emphasis on alcohol, but even then, it was difficult to eliminate it completely. At most, they could try to keep it under control.

In fact, English players' drinking problems had improved considerably over the years.

At least in the past, after matches or training sessions, players from every team would head to bars in groups of three or five.

So bar culture was actually a very important part of English football culture. Many clubs had even been founded in bars.

By comparison, the fact that a player's drinking could now become news showed that things had improved.

But culture was ultimately difficult to eradicate, especially for English players who had been exposed to it from childhood.

People in their early twenties were at the peak of their physical strength, with seemingly endless energy. Even if they had drunk themselves senseless the night before, a night's sleep would leave them more or less recovered by the next morning. This gave them the mistaken impression that alcohol did not really affect a footballer's body.

Little did they know that the harm caused by alcohol was silent and insidious.

Everyone knew that the foundation of football was the body. Muscle strength was crucial to a professional player, while testosterone was the key to muscle growth and recovery.

Studies had shown that one bottle of beer could cause a person to lose a quarter of their testosterone over the following ten to sixteen hours.

The exact process was extremely complicated, but it was a universally acknowledged fact that drinking had a major