Page 147 - Pep Guardiola: Another Way of Winning: The Biography

that summer of 2010 even after Cesc told Arsène Wenger he wanted to leave. The French coach
listened to Cesc but did not promise him anything.
The then president Joan Laporta had asked Fàbregas to take that step to help the proceedings,
thinking Wenger would collapse under pressure.

During the World Cup, Pep and Cesc kept in touch, and the Barcelona manager insisted he would
only go for him if Arsenal wanted to negotiate. ‘Look, Cesc,’ the manager told him. ‘Either it’s you or
I get someone from the youth teams to take your place, I don’t mind. For me, I only want you, but
Arsenal are keeping us waiting until the end of August for a resolution.’
Beguiristain talked occasionally with Wenger and told him he was fed up with hearing Puyol,
Piqué and Xavi say, each time they came back from playing with the Spanish national team, that Cesc
wanted to return to Barça. Cleverly implying that Barcelona were almost forced to get the midfielder,

that Arsenal had to let him go – usual negotiating tricks. ‘I’ve only phoned you because they told me
to ring you, and because I know you have spoken to the player and you told him we could ring you.’
Beguiristain reminded Wenger that, as it said on the official Barcelona website, the Catalan club
would not negotiate till Arsenal were willing to do so. Arsène was still uncommitted.
Cesc thought this was a once in a lifetime opportunity and felt he had to do as much as he could to
avoid them going for somebody else. But then politics got in the way. Barcelona were experiencing a

tense change of guard, with Sandro Rosell becoming the new president, replacing his arch enemy
Joan Laporta, and Andoni Zubizarreta the new director of football instead of Beguiristain. And a
conversation between the new man in charge and Wenger fatally wounded the transfer that summer.
‘He is not a priority.’ Those were the words used by Rosell when Wenger questioned the need for
Barcelona to sign the player. ‘Not a priority.’ Was the new president negotiating or just giving up on
the player, as he perhaps felt his signature would have been considered not his success but the
success of the previous president who had started the discussions?

What was concluded thereafter and in the eyes of everybody involved in the transfer saga was that
Rosell was not at all attracted by the possibility of bringing back a former young player at such a huge
cost. Or not at that point, as it transpired.
Wenger, who stopped taking calls from Barcelona from that same moment, seized the opportunity.
The French coach told Cesc that Barcelona, or the new chairman, had reduced the pressure, that he
didn’t want him that much, that he was not, in Rosell’s eyes, ‘a priority’.

The transfer was not going to take place that summer.
Pep was the first person to ring Fàbregas when that became known. ‘Listen, don’t worry,’ he told
the frustrated youngster. ‘I know you tried. We will try to make it happen next year.’
When Fàbregas gave a press conference to confirm he was staying, this is how he described his
feelings: ‘It wasn’t possible. I had been interested in going but it didn’t happen. One of the most
positive things I got from the summer was that I saw there are people in football who are really worth
the effort.’ He was talking about Guardiola.

As promised, the next year came and Barcelona showed their intent to get him. That gave Cesc the
confidence to think the deal was to take place and confirmed his view that his idol was a man of his
word.
Fàbregas was so determined to go to Barcelona that he reduced his yearly wages by one million
and put that money towards the transfer fee as the conversations between clubs, once started in the
summer of 2011, were developing very slowly.

By then the rumours that the new season could be the last one for Guardiola had started. The
conversations between Pep and Cesc resumed. The player didn’t know how to ask, but he did need to