Pep Confidential

Authors: Martí Perarnau

PEP

CONFIDENTIAL

INSIDE PEP GUARDIOLA’S FIRST SEASON
AT BAYERN MUNICH

First published in Great Britain in 2014 by
ARENA SPORT
An imprint of Birlinn Limited
West Newington House
10 Newington Road
Edinburgh
EH9 1QS

www.arenasportbooks.co.uk

Published in association with
BACKPAGE PRESS
www.backpagepress.co.uk

ISBN: 9781909715257
eBook ISBN: 9780857908179

First published in Spain in 2014 by Rocca Editorial as
Herr Pep

The right of Martí Perarnau to be identified as the author of this work has been asserted by him in accordance with the Copyright, Designs and Patents Act 1988.

All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored, or transmitted in any form, or by any means electronic, mechanical or photocopying, recording or otherwise, without the express written permission of the publisher.

Every effort has been made to trace copyright holders and obtain their permission for the use of copyright material. The publisher apologises for any errors or omissions and would be grateful if notified of any corrections that should be incorporated in future reprints or editions of this book.

British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available on request from the British Library.

Designed and typeset by Polaris Publishing, Edinburgh

Printed and bound by Clays St Ives

Contents

List of Illustrations

Acknowledgements

Part One – Time, Patience, Passion
1.	Dinner with Kasparov
2.	‘I Need to know Everything about the Club, as Quickly as Possible.’
3.	‘I Could see myself Coaching Here One Day.’
4.	‘They will be at the Vanguard of European Football for the Next Five Years.’
5.	‘I’m Desperate to watch Training – I Want to see what Pep Decides to Change.’
6.	‘Leo, It’s Pep. Can you come over? Now, Please.’
7.	‘Do you see Lahm’s Potential?’
8.	‘Thiago’s Coming.’
9.	‘The Idea is to Dominate the Ball.’
10.	‘We Don’t have a Messi or a Ronaldo – But we have the Right Collective Mentality.’
11.	‘Who are our Unstoppable Guys? Ribéry and Robben.’
12.	‘They’ll Climb that Mountain 10 Times in a Row.’
13.	‘I told Rosell I Would be Going 6000km away from him.’
14.	‘Borussia Deserved to win.’
Part Two – The First Trophy
15.	‘Maybe it was a Mistake.’
16.	‘What do you know about Athleticism?’
17.	‘Javi, Look at Dante, Look at Dante, The Line, The Line!’
18.	‘It’s not Possession that Matters, But the Intention Behind it.’
19.	‘I Don’t have any Midfielders.’
20.	We’re Trying to do this Right, Not Just Win Titles.’
21.	‘Bring the Ball Out Well and you will Play Well.’
22.	‘I Loathe all that Passing – That Tiquitaca.’
23.	‘Lahm … The Guy is Fucking Exceptional!’
24.	‘Pam! Pam! That’s our Style of Play!’
25.	‘Bayern were like something out of a Movie Today.’
26.	‘Lads, I don’t know how to take Penalties. I’ve Never Taken One in My Life. But here’s the Best Penalty Taker in the World.’
Part Three – 2013: A Prodigious Year
27.	‘Right Now I’m not the best in the world.’
28.	‘Hoeness is the Heart and soul of this Club – He’s Vital to me.’
29.	‘We are all Hiding Behind the Coach.’
30.	‘Gentlemen, this is Tiquitaca and it is Shit.’
31.	The Treasure Map
32.	‘Lahm? he’s as Football-Intelligent as Iniesta.’
33.	‘For 80 Minutes we Played Perfect Football – The Best Football I’ve seen in my Life.’
34.	‘If anyone would Prefer me not to make the Decisions, No Problem. You Decide who’s Going to Play.’
35.	‘I’m not Saying my Way is Better. It’s Just my Way.’
36.	‘Diego! I Love You!’
37.	‘Put the Good Players in the Midfield. That’s my Idea and I’m Going to Stick with it.’
38.	‘The Whole Club has told me that Franck wants to Talk to me. I want to Talk to him, too.’
39.	‘Excellence is Like a Bubble. You can Look for it, But it only Appears from Time to Time.’
40.	‘Mistakes Come when you Relax.’
41.	‘Here we are Again. Another Final.’
Part Four – The League in March
42.	‘In Six Months here Pep has Tried more things than in Four Years at Barça.’
43.	‘I’m Going to have to make some Radical Changes.’
44.	‘I Look at the Footage of our Opponents and then Try to Work out how to Demolish them.’
45.	‘Perfect Football is Damn Difficult to Achieve.’
46.	‘He’s so Intense that he’ll Exhaust us.’
47.	‘They like the Idea of Telling Their Friends: I Play for Pep Guardiola.’
48.	‘Just as well we had Manu. Without that Hand I Don’T know where we’d be.’
49.	‘Lahm Brings this Team to Life.’
50.	‘I’ve Gone for Control. Control and more Control.’
51.	‘Uli is Our Heart. It’s Hard to Imagine Bayern without him.’
52.	‘Picking a Line-Up is Like Sitting in Front of your Chess Pieces.’
53.	‘I Love You Pep. You are in my Heart, Man.’
Part Five – Falling Down and Getting Back up Again
54.	‘It Hurts – It makes you Feel like your Skin is Burning.’
55.	‘Always Pick the Good Ones. Always.’
56.	‘The Essence of Football is Working out the Best way to attack your Opponents.’
57.	‘I’ve Never Played like this … Not Even in my Boldest Days at Barça.’
58.	‘Arjen’s a Beast.’
59.	‘I don’t Consider Myself a Good Coach.’
60.	‘We have to Remember that if we don’t Run, we’re Nothing.’
61.	‘A Complete Fuck-Up.’
62.	I Saw Pep Utterly Beaten for the First Time.’
63.	Mea Culpa
64.	‘All Teams go through Different Phases’
65.	‘Javi And Robben, in Defence and Attack’
66.	Bloom in the Glow of Happiness
67.	The Kid and the Captain