FCBARCELONA.CAT

20.07.2009 13:56

“The team’s a joy”

Roger Bogunyà

In his first press conference for the 2009/10 season, Josep Guardiola reviewed the latest events at Barça. He described the team as “a joy” and said that he’d like to have “16 or 17 reliable players”.

Guardiola is happy with his squad but as manager he’s going to do some fine tuning. “The team is a joy, and if we can we’ll do some fine tuning. I’d like to have 16 or 17 reliable players to rotate and so people can’t guess our line-ups.” Pure Guardiola: sincere, direct and with humour.

“The base is already there”

Guardiola believes the transfer market has undergone major change with Madrid’s signings and this will affect Barça. “Looking at the market, I can’t say how many players we’ll sign,” he said. “It’d be better if they came now, but the market decides in the end.”

In any case, signing late is not decisive because “the base is already there. It’d be different if we had to sign 8 or 9 players”.

Prefers small squad

After saying he’d like to have 16 or 17 reliable players, Guardiola admitted he preferred small squads: “I don’t want large squads like those at Madrid or Inter”. And he said that if necessary “I’ll nick some players off Luis Enrique” and rely on the Barça Atlètic squad.

“I have a lot of faith in my team”

Guardiola says this season won’t be like the last one, especially in terms of relations with the players. “Now we know each other,” he said. “Everyone says the same: the second year’s tougher than the first.” That calls for fresh motivation for his players: “I have to do what I can so that they have the same stimulus and humility to continue winning. I have a lot of faith in my team”.

Treble is the past

Guardiola is pleased by how little has been said and written recently about Barça’s treble. He believes it’s better for the players not to think about past triumphs as everyone now starts again from zero. “We shouldn’t go around saying how good we were last term,” he argued. “We already celebrated that in April and May when we were doing it.”

Madrid as motivation

Madrid’s signings also came up. Guardiola thinks Kaká, Ronaldo and Benzema “are very good”, though he doesn’t feel “jealous”. “They have the cash, they put it down on the table and scooped the lot,” he said. Those signings could be extra motivation for his players. “Motivation is needed every day and you only play Madrid twice. Doing things like last year is a great challenge”. A challenge that begins now.