TROPHIES AND TENSION IN THEIR TIME AT BARCELONA

PETE JENS0N

‘IT IS a very sweet night, one of the happiest of my football life,’ said Pep Guardiola as Barcelona won 6-2 away at Real Madrid in 2009. Yaya Toure put in a swaggering performance in a deep central midfield position for all but five minutes of the contest. It was a perfect night. The relationship between the manager, who had been a midfielder himself, and the Ivorian was not always so ‘sweet’. When Guardiola promoted Sergio Busquets from the B team into the holding role, Toure found himself out of favour. Not many could complain about a midfield three of Busquets, Andres Iniesta and Xavi but Toure did. Still, he played 77 games for Guardiola, winning both the Champions League and the Copa del Rey, playing the finals as a central defender. He also left the club with two Spanish league titles. When he departed for the Premier League in 2010, this is what he had to say on goal.com: ‘Whenever I asked him something, he (Guardiola) always gave strange answers. He pretty much ignored me until City’s offer came in. That’s why I eventually opted to leave. I didn’t speak to Guardiola for a year. ‘If he had talked to me, I would have stayed at Barcelona. I wanted to end my career at Barcelona. However he had no faith in me.’ Guardiola denied the claims, telling AS: ‘I talk to anyone and the doors to my office and house are always open for the players. The truth is that (Toure) asked to leave. We even tried to convince him to stay.’ Guardiola coached three big-name African players at Barcelona as well as French defender Eric Abidal, who was born to Martinican parents in Lyon. Toure was not the only one from that group who fell foul of his manager. Guardiola wanted to sell Samuel Eto’o before taking over the first team but was dissuaded by other senior

players. He also asked that both Deco and Ronaldinho were cast aside before his first campaign started. They were sold in 2008. Eto’o departed a year later after playing a key role in the team winning the treble. Guardiola developed a close bond with Abidal after an early row about what language was spoken in the dressing room and he spoke of the unparalleled ‘humanity’ of Mali international Seydou Keita who was his first signing at Barcelona and was with him for four seasons. Abidal said subsequently: ‘It was complicated at the start. Guardiola confronted me about not speaking Spanish but always speaking in French with Thierry Henry. I told him, “Firstly, don’t talk to me like I am a little boy. And secondly, why can the Catalans speak to each other in Catalan?” From there the argument got more heated until I had to go to the president to explain it to him.’ Abidal went on to say in the same interview: ‘He is a topclass coach. I learned every day with him.’ Keita played 188 games for Barcelona under Guardiola. ‘He has been my moral barometer all these years,’ said Guardiola of Keita. ‘There are very few players who have given as much as he has. I have never met a person with more humanity and doubt I ever will.’