Do professional clubs work on these experiences? Do you feel like clubs are prepared to help a player in this way?
There’s really no time with clubs because each have their own pressures and obligations to win. That’s why, in part because of what I’ve been through, you can handle it at a group level and that strengthens the team. At an individual level, I think it’s the player himself who must make the decision and take the initiative to face all those insecurities to be prepared as best as possible.
Can you work through it within the club with someone trained to help? Yes, obviously, but really there’s not much of that. There’s a lot of physical therapists who can help you with injuries. With these other situations, since not a lot of them are known, there isn’t that awareness that I think could be helpful not just to the club but to the manager as well.
Ansu has had problems after coming back from injury, Gavi sometimes seems too fired up on the pitch: do you think it has to do with pressure or mental health? The pressure that Pedri has, for example, because fans say that Barca lose when he is not there?
If that’s the case, it’s because there is reason to talk about it. Ansu has proved to be a great, great player; the same as Gavi and Pedri. And that’s what I was talking about. It’s not their responsibility what happens on the outside.
Ansu is going through something that is not at all his doing. He’s a young guy who had a big injury, made a decision based on advice from the club and, in turn, for the best possible path to recovery for his knee. He did everything he could on his end. We’re talking about a significant injury that he’s had to overcome at a very young age. It’s all part of the process.
It’s the same with Gavi, and everything that’s surrounding his situation. It’s his style of play, of understanding the game, and whatever happens on the outside doesn’t have to affect him regardless of the conditions.
I would like to think that they are players who are more than prepared and can continue to be important players at Barca. Logically, they are still in the early stages and have to follow this road for many more years to come.
Does this fascination to find the ‘new Messi’ put too much pressure on the young players?
Yes, but I think it has always been the same and it will always be the same. It’s a reflection of society. We want everything in the moment, and we don’t value what we have and we don’t value ourselves. Sometimes we value the person next to us more and that sometimes takes away the satisfaction that we could have if we felt and observed what each one of us has.
Having said that, I also don’t really understand the need to find or want to find that “new Messi” or, before Messi, that “new Ronaldinho.” Because, in the end, each one of us is losing the essence of what that player can become, who has nothing to do with another one and the beauty of this is that it is so.
What’s next for you? Perhaps working with young players?
Some of it is passing on and sharing my experiences from my career as a football player. As far as the second chapter, which started not that long ago, there are not a lot of words that have been written yet. What I want to do is keep writing them, continue feeling it all. Really, seeing all those concerns that could come up where I could find a place to fully grasp them, that would be satisfying on a personal as well as a professional level.
At Barca?
I’m not fixated on any one place; it would be a mistake do to that. Obviously, Barcelona is a huge organisation, it’s all but my second home, and I would be proud to be a part of the club on a level that works with my situation. But I’m not focused on just one place. There are several situations that could come into play where I could continue to write my next chapter.
