Almost a religion

I’ve never been in a hurry.

It is my first time as a manager in the Primera División, after a long time working on the bench. But I’m not worried about what happens from now on.

If everything goes well, as I hope, it will be great. But if next season, or in two or three years I have to go back to the Segunda División, I will do it without any problems.

Whatever happens, one thing is clear to me: how I want to achieve my goals. That is influenced by my time at Barcelona. I was there for many years — 28, to be precise — first as a player, then as a coach in the youth academy.

That is a long time under the ‘Barça style’.

I arrived at the club in 1986, as a 12-year-old. At that time, Barça’s youth academy was like the rest of the main youth academies. The aim was to have the best players in each age group, and then each coach had his own way of approaching the games. There was no set line.          

"everything was marked by what cruyff said at the top, and from there it was transferred downwards"

But that changed when Johan Cruyff arrived two years later. His impact was transferred from the first team to the youngest youth team. I experienced that impact when I was 14 years old — an age where it really left a mark on me.

We were 14-year-olds who trained the same way as the first team. We played positional games, lots of rondos and short matches. In the actual games, we also played like the first team. Just like Cruyff’s Barça!

There were other changes. Among them, players started to be defined by numbers. Each number referred to how you played and what you did on the pitch. I was the seven. This number was for wingers. In my case, the right winger.

Everything was marked by what Cruyff said at the top, and from there it was transferred downwards. It was a philosophy with a main principle that I would define as winning with your own style. My journey as a player at Barcelona was based on these principles, which became almost a religion for me.

I was part of what was known as the ‘Mini Quinta’, after the stadium where the reserve team played, with teammates including Iván De la Peña, Albert Celades, Toni Velamazán, Roger and Quique Álvarez. And I made my debut with the first team in the last game of the 1995/96 season, with Carles Rexach as coach.

"Josu was very brave in his philosophy and changes WITH systems of play"

Carles was Cruyff’s right-hand man, and also one of the most important people in the work done at La Masia. I would say that if Cruyff was the ideologist, Carles was the custodian of Cruyff’s idea.

I only got to play that one official game with the first team, plus another friendly match. It is true that I won’t go down in history for that, but for me it is something very important. I played in all the Barça youth teams, and fulfilled my dream of making my debut with the first team in an official match.

After that game against Deportivo de La Coruña, in the summer of 1996, I went on loan to Extremadura. They were playing in the Primera División that year. Until then, I had never met coaches from other teams, only those from Barça.

That was when I met Josu Ortuondo. He was a different kind of coach. Josu was ahead of his time, managing a modest team like Extremadura. He was very brave in his philosophy and changes with systems of play, something that wasn’t very common at that time. The coaches then had a system they stuck to, and went all the way with it.

"I respected everything I had learned as a Barcelona player and transferred that to my coaching"

After that, I went back to Barcelona B, had a loan spell at Figueres and finally left Barça to go to Hospitalet. At all the clubs outside Barça, I had to adapt to other ways of playing. These were styles that were very different from each other, as well as from Barça’s.

It is not easy for a player who has spent his whole life in the Barça youth system to play in a different way, but you have to do it. I guess that happens to everyone.

After being away from Barça for a couple of years, in 2001 I returned to the Barça fold. I was still in my last days as a player at Hospitalet, but that is when I started coaching. In a very amateur way, because I wasn’t earning any money. Álex García, who is now my assistant coach, joined Barcelona’s youth team, Cadete A — the 14 and 15-year-olds — and asked me if I wanted to join him.

I said yes, but warned him that I was still active as a player and maybe I wouldn’t be able to go to some training sessions. I also warned him that I would miss some matches, because I was playing away from Catalonia at weekends. Álex didn’t mind. It was all just to help him and for me to learn.

It was a good combination that lasted two years. In 2003, there were elections for the Barcelona presidency. Both Álex and I left the club after Joan Laporta won.

My second spell away from Barcelona lasted three years. I had retired as a player when, in 2006, I became head coach of the Cadete A. Alex was coaching Juvenil A — the Under-18 academy team — if I remember correctly.

"We played with mainly link-up players, not physically very strong"

From the beginning, I respected everything I had learned as a Barcelona player and transferred that to my coaching.

We were always protagonists with the ball, and imposed ourselves on our opponents with that mentality. Including against much more physical opponents than us, like in the UEFA Youth League that we won in 2018. We beat Paris Saint-Germain, Atlético Madrid, Manchester City and, in the final, Chelsea, with a resounding 3-0 win.

We played with mainly link-up players, not physically very strong, and through our play we were able to beat them all. That also helped people to believe again in the idea that with homegrown, very young, technically and physically gifted players, we were capable of competing and beating anyone. We could win titles with a set idea of play.

When I arrived at Barcelona B in April 2018, shortly after winning the Youth League, my role remained the same. But this time it was conditioned by a very important task: developing players for the first team. So I often lost players from my team because they went up to the first team.

"My name came up in the media as an option after Ronald Koeman’s departure, but I knew it was difficult"

If I had put myself only in the role of a coach who is looking out for his own interests, trying to win, I would have had a very hard time, because the best players get taken away. But I was always very clear about my role. We all had the obligation to be ready for the first team.

I also made that commitment for myself. If one day the first team needed me for a game or two, or half a season, or a season, I had to be ready for it.

I wasn’t afraid of coaching Barcelona’s first team, because at the end of the day I was going to do the same as I had done in the youth team. Obviously, with many more demands and much more responsibility, but the only thing I was sure of was that I would be ready in case the first team needed me.

However, that opportunity did not come. My name came up in the media as an option after Ronald Koeman’s departure, but I knew it was difficult. I didn’t want to get my hopes up or generate any expectation.

"We thought that players from the Canary Islands would adapt well to our way of understanding the game"

In June 2021, I left Barcelona. I had one more year on my contract and I think we were doing a good job: developing players for the first team, competing and getting results. But in the end, for whatever reason — I was given no apparent one — my contract was terminated.

I was a bit surprised by the club’s decision. Even more so, given they had informed me two weeks earlier that I was going to continue. But I had changed my mindset, knowing it was time to move on. I was very clear that it was going to be my last season at Barça B. I wanted to take a step forward.

After leaving Barcelona, we took it easy for a while. My assistant Álex and I looked at several possibilities, and then in January 2022 the option of Las Palmas came up. This was a club we thought could be the ideal place for us.

Why? Because of the profile of the team and the players. We thought, above all, that players from the Canary Islands would adapt well to our way of understanding the game — to have control of the ball and, from there, to direct the games.

An example of this is Pedri, now at Barcelona, but who was brought up at Las Palmas. We also felt very much in touch with the sporting director, Luis Helguera, from the very beginning.

"The pressure every game was immense, because we couldn’t fail"

We started in the Segunda División, with a draw and a win. A good start, no doubt, but then it went wrong. We went five games without a win. That is when doubts arose, which is normal for a team aspiring to promotion, but we didn’t change our mindset.

And, most importantly, the players believed in us.

In the last 11 games, we won nine and drew two. I don’t remember having done that before. Not even when I was in the Barcelona youth team, where we almost always had a big superiority over our rivals.

The pressure every game was immense, because we couldn’t fail. If we wanted to reach the playoff for promotion to the Primera División, there was no margin for error. With that spectacular final run of results, we made it to the playoffs.

However, the team went into the playoff against Tenerife, the club's eternal rivals, with their backs to the wall. We were exhausted after the enormous effort we had made in the final stretch of the season.

"Playing in La Liga changes everything"

It was a shame, because we lost a great opportunity for promotion, but we had managed to build very important foundations. As strange as it may sound, for me that elimination against Tenerife in the promotion playoff was the beginning of our promotion a year later.

Of course, the past season was very hard, with complicated moments, but we never doubted ourselves. Even less so in the last match against Alavés for promotion.

I confess that it was one of the most difficult games in my career, with a lot of nerves and agony until the end. A 0-0 draw against Alavés was enough for us to get promoted.  Despite all the suffering, it was the game that got us into the Primera.

Playing in La Liga changes everything, because of the level of the opponents and the context of the competition.

But it doesn’t change how we want to play.