Page 100 - Pep Guardiola: Another Way of Winning: The Biography

them. That destroys me.
‘The substitutes would do a better job if their ungrateful manager gave them an extended run of games.
‘I do more work as a team manager than as a coach, because, as there are games every three days, there are few pure footballing
training sessions and there is a lot of co-existence and it isn’t easy. But the lucky thing in this team is having found people with important
human values.
‘A column in the press, instead of a front-page headline, is sometimes more influential on the players’ moods than my own opinion. I
have to know which headlines have come out about a player. If I have two stars and there are three headlines about one, I’m going to
approach the player who hasn’t had any.
‘There are things that denote how a team is. Today we planned to meet at five o’ clock and by 4.30 most of us were here. They
know, because I have said it and they have seen it, that when they stop doing it, anyone can beat us. If each person does their job, and
they know what it is because I make sure they know, then we are a team that is difficult to beat.
‘I have to conserve this passion that I have for what I do. The day that I stop feeling it, I will leave. Now I want to tell a player off
and then hug him immediately after. If you lose that, that’s bad ... when I stop correcting a player during training, it will mean that I have
lost my passion. When I no longer get excited, I will go. That’s what happened to me when I was a player.
‘At another team? It would be exactly the same. My closeness to my players is lessening. This year, less than last year, it is self-
defence. Because I suffer, I prefer to distance myself.’

From his very first day in the job as coach, Pep went out of his way to appeal to the feelings of his
players: demanding solidarity and effort from everyone. Those values represent a reflection of

himself. He knew that in order to lead the group he must be consistent, manage the little details and
big egos – and convince everyone, not only to do as he asked, but to believe in what he was asking
them to do.
And his ability to communicate is perhaps his greatest talent.
Imagine you are a player now. It is the day of a home game. You have trained in the morning and
then eaten with the rest of your team-mates in the training complex of Sant Joan Despí and then, as
usual, Pep sends you all back home, to be with your families and have a rest. You love that, you don’t

have to hang around for games and somehow training becomes more intense, energetic, more fun. You
have to return to the Camp Nou later, two hours before kick-off.
Around an hour before the start of the game, and when you are not completely ready to warm up,
Pep takes his jacket off. He wears a tight shirt, white most of the time, with a tie and the sleeves
rolled up. He’s at work. You all head into a large room next to the dressing room and sit down to

listen to him. He claps a couple of times, ‘Gentlemen,’ he shouts, and at that moment silence falls and
you’re about to have your eyes opened by him, he’ll tell you the road to success in that particular
match. He will make you see it, visualise it.
You go back to the dressing room and there you won’t see Pep, who hides in his office. As part of
the process of becoming a manager, he began keeping his distance from the players and the changing
room became almost exclusively for the players, so much so that on many occasions he could be seen
waiting outside the door, shouting to one of his assistants, ‘how long before they go out?’ If he was
told five minutes, he would linger awhile before going in and issuing rapid-fire instructions. He

understands his presence could influence the footballers’ behaviour on their own territory. It should
be a refuge where they, you, can say what you think at any time without fear of punishment. You can
talk about girls, cars, even have a go at him if you want. Ask Xavi; he’ll explain it to you:
Xavi: Sure. He told us from the beginning, ‘I won’t go in there.’ It’s like a classroom without the
teacher. And when the teacher comes in, there’s silence and it’s time to work.

Manel Estiarte: He has to go through the dressing room in the stadium because his office is at the
end of it. But he will not be seen with the players unless it is to talk to them after a game, to motivate
them or remind them of something, or to give them a hug before it. There is always a huddle and shout
before the game. He arrives, they hug and he goes. As the ex-player he is, he always says, ‘This is the
place where they joke, they might laugh at me, they might criticise me.’