Free Pep Confidential by Marti Perarnau

the nearest player in position to press the man who’s about to receive the ball; moving calmly into the middle to create and use space; working in a co-ordinated way. Pep breaks down his fundamental ideas about the game for me.
    ‘This team just needs to slow down a bit. They’ve already got everything else down pat. They need some deceleration in the centre of the field. Neuer makes a clean pass and they move together to penetrate deeper – completely co-ordinated. I want intricate passing as they move forward, not too fast initially, so that none of our men ends up in the wrong place. A highly-organised advance until they reach the centre and then, boom! We trample them underfoot!’
    Kroos possesses this ability to slow down, as do Schweinsteiger and Götze. And Thiago.
    ‘Thiago’s coming,’ Pep tells me.
    I have to ask him several times: ‘Which Thiago? Thiago Alcántara? Thiago from Barça? Are you talking about the pearl of the Barça youth system?’
    ‘Yes, that Thiago,’ he replies.
    Bayern are hoping to transfer Mario Gómez to Fiorentina and, since the striker is happy to make the move, the deal looks set to go through. The club will then buy Thiago, whom Barcelona have been trying to transfer since the summer of 2011, a year before Guardiola left the Catalan club.
    Mario Gómez is a committed professional with a strong work ethic. He continues to train as hard as his team-mates despite the fact that his transfer to the Italian team is about to go through. In other circumstances, Pep would be quite happy to keep him because he values the player. In reality, however, he would struggle to find a role for the German striker alongside the other centre-forwards, Mandžukić and Pizarro, in the false 9 system his team will play. Pep already relies on Mario Götze and Frank Ribéry to fulfil this role and Gómez’s departure is therefore inevitable – which must mean that Thiago’s arrival is imminent.
    In fact Thiago is interested in signing only for Bayern, and the deal is done without any difficulty. Despite claims by some sections of the media that he is considering Manchester United, the eldest of the Alcántara brothers is desperate to be reunited with Guardiola. For the time being he is holed up in a little holiday house in Begur, on the Costa Brava, where he barely has any means of communication with the outside world. He has even had to buy a special antenna to get an internet connection. Thiago will spend several tense days waiting for Gómez to sign with Fiorentina and for Rummenigge, Bayern’s chief executive, to close the deal with Barça. In the end it will be eight long days before negotiations are completed, on Sunday, July 14.
    Guardiola and his staff are extremely happy at Bayern. As a nation the Germans are renowned for their efficient, if at times overly rigid organisational skills and the Bayern press department certainly lives up to this reputation. They have established a press centre here in Trentino which would be the envy of any World Cup media centre.
    The people at Bayern treat Guardiola and his staff with the greatest of care. Nobody doubts for a moment that he is second only to the president in terms of importance and everyone works together to ensure his ideas and plans are fully implemented. People are already commenting on the efficiency of the member of staff responsible for logistical organisation, as well as the impressive work of the team manager, Kathleen Krüger, a young woman who until recently was a midfielder in the successful Bayern women’s team. Kathleen is responsible for all first-team administration issues and she carries out her duties with assured efficiency.
    A few days ago Pep stopped taking German lessons. His teacher, a Borussia Dortmund fan, stayed in New York. Pep believes that he now knows enough to carry out the daily interactions with players and press. ‘Our language on the pitch is all about giving instructions. I use the imperative a lot: