MAN IN A HURRY
He turned the semi-final round in a matter of minutes…and Watford’s wizard wasn’t wasting time in our interview either!
ALITTLE over five minutes into our interview and Gerard Deulofeu starts to motion with his right hand.
It looks at first as though he is maybe stifling a sneeze. When he does it again a minute later, it seems as though he is swatting away an imaginary fly.
It’s not exactly a conversational aid but it’s not meant to be. What the young Watford midfielder is actually trying to do is indicate that the interview is over.
‘I said I would do 10 minutes,’ he says.
I point out that we have been talking for seven, and that 10 minutes is not an awfully long time for an interview arranged to set up the showpiece finale of the English football season.
‘I said I would do 10 minutes,’ he says, once more, for emphasis. So it turns out that a player some have said is rather stubborn is indeed rather stubborn. Not remotely unpleasant with it, but stubborn nonetheless.
Once of Barcelona, once tipped to be as good as almost anything produced by the club’s fabled La Masia youth academy, Deulofeu has said previously that his career has suffered at the hands of his own impatience.
He says he is not like that any more, but here he sits offering clear evidence to the contrary. Or maybe he just doesn’t like interviews.
He’s no more patient for the photographs. Sportsmail’s photographer doesn’t need him for long, but it all seems to be a bit of a chore. So, pretty soon, with a smile and a handshake, Deulofeu is gone. GERARD Deulofeu is the main reason Watford are in the FA Cup final at all. His first goal as substitute against Wolves in a fascinating semi-final, just 12 minutes after coming on, gave Watford hope they could recover a 2-0 deficit. His second, in extratime, won his team the game.
It seems strange he was a substitute and it would be a surprise if the same thing happened today. The 25-year- old started five of the six Premier League games that followed.
Certainly, frustration helped to fuel what happened at Wembley almost a month ago.
‘It was difficult for me to find out I was not playing so I was hungry to go on the pitch and show what I can do,’ he said.
‘To be 2-0 down is hard, but in England it’s nothing. In five or 10 minutes you can change it.
‘I always said it’s better to play 25 or 30 minutes well rather than 60 minutes badly.’
Deulofeu’s first goal was lovely, caressed delicately with the instep of his right foot. He didn’t realise quite how good it was until he watched it back that night on the television.
‘Then I knew it was one of my best ever,’ he smiled.
Those familiar with Deulofeu’s career will not have been surprised by the high tariff execution. His talent has never been in doubt. Born in Catalonia, he was recruited by Barcelona at the age of nine.
Briefly, he played for Pep Guardiola, who he will meet again at Wembley this evening. The Manchester City manager has previously described Deulofeu as ‘special’ and the ‘world’s best at one on one’ which is not remotely faint praise.
Deulofeu has hinted in the past that the spotlight was maybe just a little too bright for him in Spain. ‘At Barcelona, you always have eyes on you,’ he told The
Guardian only last December. If he felt it all a little too much then he will not be the first or the last, but his take on it this week was different.
‘It’s not easy to manage it when you are really young and learning,’ he shrugged.
‘But that’s life at a top team, that’s the pressure you have. That is why they are the big teams and the best teams.
‘ The pressure is equal to quality. If you want to be the biggest one you have to manage the pressure.
‘Ask Messi if he has managed the pressure. He is the best and seems OK doesn’t he?’
Deulofeu has had an itinerant career. A flying start saw him in the Barcelona first team under Guardiola at the age of 17 and the next summer he was named player of the tournament as Spain won the European U19 Championships.
After that, things got a little more complicated. Loans at Everton and Sevilla preceded a permanent move to Goodison Park in July 2015. Then, after Ronald Koeman took over from Roberto Martinez, he was loaned to AC Milan before Barcelona activated a buy-back clause to re-sign him two summers later.
That experiment failed and did so quickly. By the following January — 2018 — he moved to Watford on loan and then signed permanently last June.
Asked what all the travelling has been about, Deulofeu shrugged and said: ‘We all want to play in top teams. I am fighting here and playing football to one day reach my objectives and my dreams.
‘So let’s see what happens. Right now I am here and enjoying it and the most important thing is Watford. And the future, who knows?’
Popular at Watford, there are nevertheless some clues in Deulofeu’s past that may explain why he is yet to settle. At Everton Martinez loved him, but one source on Merseyside described him this week as ‘high maintenance’.
Arsenal boss Unai Emery explained Deulofeu’s lack of minutes while managing him at Sevilla by saying: ‘He has incredible qualities, but doesn’t have the maturity or capacity for sacrifice.’
All players grow, of course, and Deulofeu believes that he has.
He was only 20 when he was at Sevilla but at Watford he has successfully set aside many of the habits drilled into him at Barcelona to adapt to a style of play under Javi Gracia that is a little more direct.
Troy Deeney has clear attributes, but they were not the ones Deulofeu was brought up to understand.
‘It is 100 per cent different but finally I have got it,’ said Deulofeu.
‘It’s more direct play, of course. You have to get to the second balls quicker and take more challenges. It’s different but that’s OK.
‘The first few months here I didn’t adapt myself to the team as much as I could.
‘I didn’t understand very well how I had to play to help the team.
‘Finally I know how my team play and I have adjusted. It is working now and I enjoy it and am happy here.
‘The experience in different countries has helped me learn what is needed in football.
‘ You take something from every experience and every dressing room and afterwards you know how to manage things.’
****************** DEULOFEU first met Guardiola when he was still a kid at Barcelona, invited to join in the occasional first-team training
‘One year under Pep wasn’t enough but I am lucky to have had it’