Free Pep Confidential by Marti Perarnau Page B

is to dominate the ball.’
    ‘Language’ is the way in which the core idea is expressed on the pitch and is the culmination of a training regime which uses a range of systems, exercises and moves to reinforce understanding and mastery of the basic concepts.
    And finally, ‘people’. The quality of the ideas and the complexity of the language are of no consequence if your players are reluctant students. Essential though it may be, it is not merely sheer talent that matters here. The player must also be completely open to learning the secrets of the language, to practise them and make improvements where necessary. They must have complete faith in this process.
    In Guardiola’s view these three concepts, the ‘core idea, ‘language’ and ‘people’ are fundamental parts of any playing model and can determine a coach’s chances of success or failure.
    To Guardiola, his job at Bayern Munich presents far greater challenges than those he encountered at Barça. There is a simple explanation for this. At Barça, the language of the game is taught from a very young age. Thousands of children pass through La Masia, the club’s youth academy, where they are taught the Barça language as defined by Johan Cruyff more than 25 years ago and implemented by a serious of great coaches since then. They learn the specific details of this unique and precise language. By the end they will have mastered this particular brand of football so that by the time a player has made it into the first team he will have accumulated more than 10,000 hours of practice and training in this single playing model. As such, he has become a fluent speaker of the language.
    There is no equivalent at Bayern, at least not with the same level of uniformity either in terms of the language or the machine which teaches it – and this has a major impact on Pep’s plans. Domènec Torrent explains: ‘It’s like we’re showing them the numbers first, then the days of the week, then verbs, etc. This is a huge departure for them and we need to be flexible and cautious. In the past they were taught about man-marking and now we’re talking in terms of covering a whole area, for example. We don’t want them to mark a player and abandon the positions we’ve assigned them, because all it takes is a long pass, and the opposition will ruin our organisation. It will take time but they are assimilating everything well. Yesterday’s pressing exercises were well executed, particularly considering it was only the second time they had done them.’
    I am struck and rather surprised by the way the players interact with Guardiola. I don’t sense any of the usual hierarchical barriers between players and coach. This morning, with the sound of bird song in the air, the coach seems like just another one of the lads. Boateng and Alaba go out to the terrace to share a joke with him. Schweinsteiger interrupts and sits with him for a while as he says his goodbyes. He’s going back to Munich, along with Doctor Hans-Wilhelm Müller-Wohlfahrt, to continue treatment on his ankle which was operated on at the start of June. There are fewer of the necessary resources in Trentino than in Munich and his recovery has been slow. This worries Pep. He wants Basti to play a key role in implementing his playing model. He sends the player off with good wishes for a speedy recovery: ‘ We need you, Basti.’

    Lorenza Buenaventura arrives. He has spent the morning overseeing a strength-building workout for the youngest players, as well as an induction session for Arjen Robben, who has recently joined the team. ‘We gave Robben the same basic training the others had in their first day in the Allianz Arena, the three initial exercises and the work on developing compact defensive cover. He assimilated it all brilliantly, and quickly.’
    Guardiola is particularly interested in the Dutch forward’s work. ‘Splendid, Pep, absolutely splendid,’ reports Buenaventura. ‘He worked really