The former column of Barcelona and Spanish national team, Gerard Piqueduring the interview given to Corriere dello Sport he also spoke about the relationship with his former coach Josep Guardiola.
I would have seen you as a coach or manager but instead you chose a parallel path.
“Maybe in the future I will return to football doing other things. At the moment I feel focused and at ease. Being a coach, however, doesn’t interest me, twenty years of routine have brought me to saturation. Training every day, the match every three or four, I really needed a break.”
Also exhausted by Guardiola?
“A little, they were many years, years of career in big clubs like Manchester United and Barça where you are forced to play every three days and it ends up that you can’t take it anymore. I have wonderful memories, I was very lucky and I won a lot, I realized my childhood dream of playing at Camp Nou.”
You were part of a generation of champions. Let me ask you something: did you give more to Guardiola or he to you?
“We had incredible amounts of talent. But the most extraordinary aspect of that period is precisely the combination with Pep. We practically arrived at Barça together, me as a player, him on the bench. There were Messi, Xavi, Iniesta, Puyol, Busquets, we were homemade, sons of Masia we had always known, the understanding was natural, just as easy to follow Pep’s model”.
What is he like from the inside?
“I think that on a tactical and strategic level he is a genius, he knows how to read the game, predict how it will end, gives you all the tools necessary to be able to counterattack or defend. And then…”.
And then?
“In transmitting the motivational message he is unrivalled, and manages to keep the group’s attention high and constant even for several years. It was very complicated, in such a high quality locker room which had won so much, to guarantee the same level of performance, he changed even language.”