Archief - Spaans voetbal 2013-2014

Hi, good afternoon, Pep, what do you think of the Santos of Brazil's president's statements?

I don't know that man, I haven't had the chance to meet him, I've never been to Brazil, and during the World Cup in Japan that we won 4-0, I didn't have a chance to meet him.

Probably his intermediaries are very, very wrong. The information that they've passed on to him is very, very incorrect. That is, I wouldn't ever dare to make a statement like what he has suggested that I said.

Three years ago, I spoke with Neymar on the phone when I was the coach at Barcelona because President Rossell told me to call him to see if there was any way to convince him to come to Barça, and so I did. And the only thing I did was to try to convince him to join us. At the last FIFA gala in Zurich, I did bump into him, we were chatting, and we were chatting about football, about the Santos game, and what he thinks about football. When I became the coach at Bayern, I wanted to know what his situation was, because after talking to him on the phone years before I wasn't sure what the situation was and I wanted to ask what the situation was and if he had really signed with Barça, and if he hadn't signed with Barça, where he wanted to go, and I wanted to meet him and I set up a meeting in New York with his father. After five minutes it was clear that he wanted to go to Barça and in each of those three encounters, the first one, the one in Zurich, and the other, I told him twenty times that what he should do was to sign with FC Barcelona. And the three times that I talked to him, Tito Vilanova's name never came up, ever. It's not for me to say whether he's capable or not because he has been my assistant for five years, and last year, what he did, with the most successful league in Barça's history, is enough evidence so that it doesn't matter whether I say he's capable or not. Good players are capable of playing together always, and these two will also be.

During this year, I finished up with Barça and I only asked the president one thing: that I would go 6000 kilometers away and that they leave me alone, and they couldn't do it, they were unable to keep their word. They didn't keep their word. I did my stretch, and then I left. It wasn't their responsibility. It was me who decided to leave. So, I went 6000 kilometers away. They should do their own jobs, and be happy with the players they have. They should do what they do and I wish them all the successes in the world, because in the end those successes also belong to me in the smallest way because I don't have to explain what this club means to me.

But there have been too many things this year that just crossed the line. Using Tito Vilanova's illness to hurt me, that, that I will never forget. Because I saw Tito Vilanova in New York. And if I didn't see him more, it's because it wasn't possible. But not because of me. And to imply that I don't want things to go well for a colleague who I worked with for so long and who has helped me so much, that is just in very, very bad taste. I didn't expect it. From any of them. When I was at Barcelona, and I want everyone to know this, I did the best I knew. The best I could. With all my will.

And the decision, I made myself, they can rest easy about it. Those in the front office, as much as the coaches, and everyone else can rest easy. And do their jobs. It was me who left. There is nothing, I don't have anything to complain about them, I simply told them: please leave me alone, I'm going to live with my family, to learn English if I can, and instead of English I ended up learning German. It's the only thing that I've done this whole time.

The only thing that I ask them is this, that they go their way and let me go mine. That they stop using my friendships or my friends to hurt me. And if I want to go to dinner with Johan Cruyff, I'm going to go to dinner with Johan Cruyff. And if I want to hang out with... I don't, I don't, I don't owe anybody anything. I did my job the best I could. The rest of us, please, let them spend their time, making the best team they know how to make and I will give them a hug when I see them at the Audi Cup. If we meet at some other European competition, and anything good that can happen to Barça, that will make me happy. But there are things that I will never forget, ever. And one of those, one small thing. What the Santos president said is just a little thing. There have been others that there shouldn't have been, they shouldn't have started. They're happy. They are Barça coaches, they're in there, they're the president of Barça, and they're inside, and they should enjoy it like I enjoyed my piece of it and my time in there. I hope they enjoy it. And leave me alone to enjoy my job and to try to convince these amazing players that Bayern has given me, to try to do the best we can. The rest of it, it's about time, they, that they leave it. And if out of everything that I've said, out of everything, there's something that isn't true, let them come out and refute it. But they should come out in the open. Not intermediaries from Santos or friends of theirs from Barcelona. They should come out themselves and deny what I've said now, and what's not true about it. Then we can continue talking about it. Until then, well, that, that they spend their time making the team work and enjoying it, and that they leave me alone.