text: It's all Pep Guardiola's fault; him and the good folk of Scotland or, at least, St Andrews. It is a simplification, of course, but perhaps a useful way of understanding why, as we survey the Champions League quarter finals, there are no Premier League clubs troubling the scorers. Bayern Munich take on Porto on Wednesday night and even though they are contending with an injury crisis which leaves them without Bastian Schweinsteiger, Franck Ribery and Arjen Robben among others you might anticipate a sixth Champions League semi-final for Guardiola in his six years of management. Of course Guardiola isn't alone responsible for the decline of the Premier League in Europe; nor is it really down to St Andrews, though the iconic town with its genteel ambience played its part in continental Europe overhauling the English clubs. Pep Guardiola prepares his side for their Champions League quarter-final first leg against Porto . The Bayern boss gives instructions to his goalkeeper Manuel Neuer at a training session on Tuesday . Something happened back in 2008 when Guardiola took over at Barcelona and it wasn't that the Barcelona team changed. Frank Rijkaard had virtually the same players but Guardiola managed to find an extra 25 per cent of performance in them. What happened was a tactical change which had at its roots in St Andrews, where the Barcelona team spent their first pre season under Guardiola. There Messi was a distracted individual, sometimes sneering at Guardiola's insistence on organisation and pressing, according to Guillem Balague's account in his biographies of Messi and Guardiola. But a breakthrough came when Guardiola stuck up for Messi in his battle with the club to play for Argentina in the Beijing Olympics. The new manager took the young Argentinian under his wing, sidling up to him after training, putting his arm round him to assure him of his support. Guardiola is bidding to reach his sixth Champions League semi-final in his six years as a manager . Guardiola got Messi on side in 2008 after standing up for him in battle to represent Argentina at the Beijing Olympics . Messi, the precocious star, suddenly felt he had an ally in Guardiola. And, as a result, he began to buy into Guardiola's idea of relentless pressing to supplement the tiki taka football, which was already a template at Barcelona. For tiki taka is not what made Guardiola’s team great. 'I loathe all that passing for the sake of it, all that tiki-taka. It's rubbish and has no purpose.' It sounds like Sam Allardyce, but those are the words of the great high priest of possession football as reported by Marti Perarnau in his book Pep Confidential. What Guardiola added to Barcelona’s game was the intensity, drive and sheer energy which had wilted under Rijkaard and then moulded it with overwhelming possession. Sometimes, when assessing the English problem in Europe, it helps to reverse the question. So, rather than ask 'Why are we so bad now?' it useful to identify why were we so good between 2005-2009?' Guardiola led Barcelona to Champions League glory in 2009 and 2011 (pictured) The former Barcelona manager is thrown into the air by his players as they celebrate the 2011 success . For Chelsea fans pointing to the 2012 triumph, that it was indeed a victory of rare courage amidst adversity but the decline of English clubs had already begun and that win is effectively an outlier, bucking the established trend. Between 2005-2009 the Premier League provided 12 out of the potential 20 semi finalists for the Champions League; between 2010 to 2015 it has provided three out of 24. Even asking that question is revealing as what English clubs were really good at during that period was making the semi finals and the final rather than winning the trophy. Only Liverpool and Manchester United actually achieved that in the five-year period of English ascendancy, though, of course, Chelsea did so improbably in 2012. What was different about English clubs in that period was the injection of some of the finest tactical minds in the game to the Premier League. Jose Mourinho may never have won the trophy with Chelsea but he transformed their approach and arguably provided the foundations for the 2008 final and the remarkable 2012 win. Rafael Benitez was an extraordinary force, the Diego Simeone of that era, regularly out-witting Mourinho and taking a relatively normal Liverpool team to two finals. Guus Hiddink engineered a fine run to the semi finals building on the work of Mourinho. Manchester United won the Champions League in 2008 when English clubs were dominating the latter stages . Chelsea were an exception to the rule in 2012 when they won the tournament against all the odds . Rising to the challenge of Mourinho and Benitez, Sir Alex Ferguson was tactically at his peak in that period, playing without a recognised centre foward at times in 2008 before Guardiola and others made it fashionable. English teams had always had an intensity with which continental teams had sometimes struggled to cope. What they had lacked often was organisation and tactical nous. Benitez, Mourinho, Hiddink provided that and Ferguson responded. Put all that together and you have a cultural melting pot which, allied to the commercial success of the Premier League, was pushing players and teams to new heights. The Premier League’s TV money of course brought in good, technical foreign players which helped but that does not seem to be the key reason for its success. The money is bigger now and those players still come but it hasn't helped Manchester City. At the zenith of the Premier League's dominance, the 2008 Moscow final, ten English players started the game. Manchester City were eliminated in the last 16 this season at the hands of Barcelona . Chelsea exited at the same stage as England have no representatives in the quarter-finals . When Jurgen Klinsmann spoke about the tactical revolution he was attempting to forge in Germany in 2006 - a style of play which has since evolved at Borussia Dortmund and Bayern Munich - he explicitly referenced the Premier League and its pace. He recognised that continental Europe had fallen behind. It was new tactical ideas meeting the traditional attributes of the English game which helped the Premier League dominate Europe. Conversely, it was Guardiola - and others, such as Jurgen Klopp, Louis van Gaal, Jupp Heynckes - surpassing that intensity which in turn overhauled the Premier League. Clubs such as Barca, Bayern, Dortmund have retained their technical superiority over English clubs but they are now likely to out-run them and out-press them. In reality there is no one man responsible for that change. And, Guardiola's obsession with pressing is rooted in an admiration for South American football and especially Marcelo Bielsa, rather than the Premier League. But when that change took place, the Premier League lost its competitive edge. And when Guardiola put his arm around Messi at St Andrews back in the summer of 2008 and convinced his young protege to buy into that pressing game, European football changed forever.
target: Bayern Munich take on Porto in the Champions League quarter-final .
  Pep Guardiola bidding to reach sixth semi-final in sixth year as a manager .
  From 2005-2009 England had 12 out of 20 Champions League semi-finalists .
  In last five years only three semi-finalists have been from Premier League .
  Guardiola changed Barcelona tactically, introducing relentless pressing .
  Lionel Messi brought into it when Guardiola supported him against the club .
  Premier League clubs have struggled to cope with that intensity in Europe .