Brave New World

by Guillem Balague

  In the days building up to the game, I’d been living a dream. So it was a rude awakening when we went and conceded twice in the first half, and in that manner – due to schoolboy errors.

  As a result, at half-time I turned into a blabbermouth. I couldn’t stop talking; I didn’t want to. What was happening was plain for all to see. ‘What is this team doing? How can we let in goals like those? Is there no blood running through your veins?’ I told the players all that and more. I punched a television and almost broke it. I think they were a bit scared to see me like that – it’s the first time I’ve ever got that heated with this group.

  I asked them to go out and show more respect for the fans. I told them that I didn’t care if we won or lost, but that we couldn’t forsake what we are: a brave, aggressive, committed, high-intensity team. There was no need to talk about tactics or positioning. We’d worked on all that the day before: which flank to attack down, how to defend against them. The way we’d responded to the throw-in for the second goal . . . it was disgraceful! We were getting rid of the ball too quickly and winning it back too deep; all the signs were bad. It would’ve been easier if it was down to one player being poor, or the centre-backs being soft for the goals; then I could just haul them off. It was a broader issue at this level, but you have to really think decisions through before you make them, because they can have consequences for the rest of the season.

  I saw more aggression after the break, but it was too little, too late after rolling over for half the match. We ran seven kilometres more than the opposition, we had 15 shots, we dominated possession, but we lost to a team who competed better.

  When I faced the media, I told them that playing at Wembley – which the journalists themselves were suggesting was to blame – was no excuse. I said that we’d lacked passion.

  I’d imagined something else entirely: that I’d have to restrain the lads, put the brakes on them, stop them from being too aggressive. We thought any mistakes would stem from overexcitement. But I have an inkling that the pain I’m feeling is because something that I suspected, but didn’t want to see, has been confirmed. Something that goes all the way back to that day in Newcastle. Something that seemed coincidental, but isn’t.

  There are some things even hard work can’t improve. When certain moving parts, certain personalities, are put together, it affects the group. And to progress, it’s not enough to train, to have a good philosophy and working methods; sometimes you have to replace parts that don’t function.

  I even blurted out in front of my family, ‘Newcastle was awful, but so is this.’

  This defeat has taught me a lot. You mustn’t let emotional attachments blind you.

  I’m going to start preparing mentally to make whatever decisions are necessary come the end of the season, because we’re here to win.

  *

  In the end I fell fast asleep, albeit only for three or four hours.

  I met up with Toni, Miki and Jesús at the training ground at 7.30 a.m., as usual. While we were watching certain incidents from the Monaco match for the third time, the chairman walked into the office. We were talking about the game and we showed him why we’d been left with such a bitter taste in our mouths. Part of our job is to show the chairman stuff that the fans don’t see, and which you can’t see on television. These are often the most vital things. The conversation with Daniel was a very interesting one. Then he explained why he’d come to see me.

  ‘Do you remember David Bentley, that player I signed all those years ago?’ he said. ‘I spent big money on him and he scored that goal against Arsenal in one of his first games. Now he’s running a restaurant in Marbella. He has a good relationship with Dele Alli’s agent, and I was thinking it might be good for him to meet up with you. It occurred to me that he could talk to the youngsters and give them some advice, because these days they listen too much to what agents have to say and make lots of bad decisions, like he did.’

  Good idea with the best of intentions. But part of my job is to decide when and how to apply strategies to help our players. I liked that the chairman wanted to give us a hand, but we have to be careful. Society is changing very quickly and it might not be wise to use an example from the past, as it is not certain to have the desired effect on a different generation. Things that we were sensible to say a decade ago hardly ever provoke the same response in a younger group. This is a challenge for the coach. We are friends, psychologists, trainers in search of solutions which are different to the ones that were applied to us when we were the players’ ages.

  A while later, we also spoke to Georges-Kévin N’Koudou, a new arrival who spent a month at a hotel waiting for his transfer to be completed. Now he’s just moved into an expensive house and comes to training in a high-end car. That doesn’t strike me as the image of someone who is hungry to conquer the world. He has just landed, but he has to show his value. We told him as much.

  Simon Felstein, our Head of Communications, a good lad, hard-working and funny, had a car accident yesterday. It could’ve been very serious, but he came away unscathed. We all celebrated his lucky escape.

  *

  Two days after the Monaco match, spirits have started to lift again ahead of tomorrow’s game against Sunderland. Today we divided the group into the guys who played and the ones who didn’t, and I did some tactics with the latter.

  There was no need for a video debrief of what to improve on from the Monaco game: the message had already been conveyed in no uncertain terms. But I did hold a meeting with some of the players to explain what we had to do and how to lead from within.

  At my presser ahead of the Premier League fixture, I reiterated what I’d said before: that we’d lacked passion. I also noted that it’s a young team and it’s our job to help them grow. And suddenly more details of that tough conversation with Bielsa, right after he joined Espanyol, came flooding back to me.

  ‘How would you rate your performances last season?’ Marcelo asked me. That year I’d won an award for the best centre-back in the league.

  ‘It wasn’t quite nine or ten out of ten. I’d give myself a seven.’

  ‘Listen,’ he replied, looking me straight in the eyes. ‘I’ve watched all the games back and if I’d been the coach, you wouldn’t have played, because you’ve stopped doing lots of things that you used to. You’re not the player I used to know.’

  And, obviously, I reacted. I lost weight and trained harder. I was called up by the national team, signed for PSG and played in the World Cup.

  Such is the power of words.

  At lunchtime, I discovered that Harry Kane wanted to talk to me. I avoided him; my anger hadn’t fully passed yet. And when I’d finished eating, I decided to perform a little test. I got up and went to sit in an armchair by the balcony. Let’s see who comes over, I thought.

  Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Kane grab a piece of fruit from the buffet. He went back to his table. A short time later, he took his dirty plates over to the trays near the sofas. And then he sat down next to me. We ended up speaking until 3 p.m. I admitted to him that Bielsa had made me cry that day when he told me those home truths.

  Tomorrow against Sunderland, in our first game since the Monaco debacle, we’ll only be making two changes to the starting line-up, one of them because Dembélé is available again after serving his six-game suspension. In other words, it’ll pretty much be the same team that played against Monaco.

  I’ve got a slight earache. The doctor says it’s a minor infection.

  *

  It’s Saturday which means it was matchday. I had a bit of a temperature this morning, so I showered at the training ground to cool down. I put my tracksuit on and we headed to White Hart Lane. There isn’t even time to complain. Or stop. Today is the 18th and we don’t get another day off until the 28th once we’re back from Moscow.

  It was goalless at the break, but there wasn’t much to change. We thought the goals would come. We decided to wait a while before switching it up and it en
ded up being a good idea. Kane scored the winner in the 59th minute, but he also sustained an injury. In fact, injuries forced us into all three substitutions, which hardly ever happens. Dembélé and Dier aren’t real causes for concern, but Kane will be out for a few months.

  *

  Ahead of the League Cup tie against Gillingham, I dared to say that Marcus Edwards, a talented 17-year-old from Camden, reminds me of Messi. He moves in the same way, touches the ball many times while on a run and comes out of congested areas with similar ease. I also said that we have to be patient with him and the way he builds his own future. The way he perceives the profession and his relationship to it, will determine the type of player he becomes.

  Maybe that’s why the stadium was packed out. Marcus is one of those rare players who can get people off their seats whenever he’s on the ball. There aren’t many of them out there. When he came on for what was his debut, he showed glimpses of quality. On one occasion, he picked up the ball out wide, cut inside, played a one-two and ended up hitting a shot that would’ve been shown on all the sports channels if it had gone in.

  Janssen converted a penalty to score his first goal for the club. Eriksen captained the team which boosted his confidence. N’Koudou showed sparks of brilliance, but overall it was a day to celebrate for the academy. We won 5–0 and young Josh Onomah grabbed his first goal. Fittingly, everyone who celebrated that moment with him was also an academy product.

  *

  We picked the squad for today’s away game against Middlesbrough with an eye on the away Champions League fixture against CSKA Moscow and the following one against Manchester City. We didn’t take any risks and left out Rose, Dembélé and Dier. Son Heung-min scored both our goals which took us up to second in the league. We lacked that killer instinct to notch a third after going 2–0 up. There are no easy games in the Premier League – we ran out 2–1 winners.

  After the game, we had a chat with Aitor Karanka, who got all his coaching badges with Toni and me at the Spanish Football Federation complex in Las Rozas. His job is far from simple: he has to manage a newly promoted squad containing many new faces.

  Marcus Edwards travelled with us which was a new experience for him, although he didn’t make it on to the pitch. I’ll speak to him again tomorrow. A photo was taken of us during his debut against Gillingham in which I’m grabbing him around the neck and hugging him. It reminds me of one I have with Maradona in which I’m also grabbing him around the neck. I’m going to show it to Marcus.

  *

  Today, the day after the Middlesbrough game, we had training and a talk. I’d wanted to mention something to them for a long time about a fashionable energy drink which they consume so regularly. First of all, it does your body no good. Second, it’s unnecessary. I know what they’re after: confidence and security. Sometimes footballers cling on to things out of fear and they look for strange solutions (or shortcuts) to block their weaknesses from their minds.

  When I was at PSG, we had tests to check our stress levels. As games got closer, the technically gifted players like Ronaldinho and Arteta became less tense, while stress increased for the less technical ones. You have to know how to manage anxiety. We must give them the tools to increase their confidence.

  We discussed weight with a couple of players. We have so many games at the moment and we can’t train that much or do much extra work. When that is the case, players must control themselves, watch what they eat and relax in order not to put weight on.

  As for our match preparations, Sissoko took a knock to the head and the doctor wasn’t sure that he would be fit to play, so, as always, we took the medical advice seriously and he won’t be travelling to Moscow tomorrow.

  *

  We are staying at the Four Seasons near the entrance to Red Square. We spent some time at the hotel before heading to the stadium for a light training session in which we split into two groups: those who’d played on Saturday and those who hadn’t. During my press conference, I felt that the Russian journalists were full of confidence. They said how foreign teams often find it hard in Moscow. I reminded them how Espanyol beat Lokomotiv in 2005 and later looked for a photo in which you can see a group of Espanyol players celebrating that victory in Red Square.

  After that, we headed back to the hotel for dinner.

  Earlier in the week, Toni had received a call from a former teammate of ours, Dmitry Kuznetsov, who is now assistant coach at Rubin Kazan. We met up at the hotel bar and I reminded him his arrival, as he wasn’t European, got me into trouble when we played together at Espanyol. Back in our day, you could have five foreigners in the squad, but only three on the pitch. José Antonio Camacho was the coach and I was usually a starter. If we were losing, however, he’d take me off to bring on a different foreign player, often Kuznetsov. He did it many times and one day I got the hump. Camacho asked me what was wrong and I told him I didn’t think it was fair that I was always the one who had to come off. He told me that only three foreigners could play, but after that discussion, he didn’t sub me again. What are players like, eh?

  Before going to bed, which was already later than usual, the coaching staff and I wanted to see Red Square, but it was shut, so we had to look at it from the hotel entrance.

  After breakfast, I went back to the square with Jesús, Toni, Miki and Xavier, our chiropractor. We had to go with a security guard because it was the first time that an English side had faced a Russian team since the trouble at Euro 2016. Our fans were asked not to draw attention to the fact that they were English. How exactly could they do that, I wonder?

  We took a few photos, went to a shopping centre and then went back to the hotel to get ready for the game. Lunch was followed by resting until teatime, and then the team talk.

  Lamela came into the starting line-up, as did full-back Kieran Trippier, who’d only played one game so far, but had performed very well. We showed videos of our opponents and their set-pieces. It was then time for kick-off.

  And we won. CSKA 0–1 Tottenham. It all went to plan. We were in control and got into their final third on many occasions, but didn’t have that finishing touch. In the second half they created more chances and we decided to make a change. We brought Janssen on and added pace down the wing through N’Koudou. Lamela moved into the middle and given that he isn’t a pure number 9, he added energy to the attack and created space by moving their centre-backs out of position. That’s how the goal came about. Lamela dropped deep to play in Son, who scored again. We were happy, but felt that we must be more lethal in front of goal.

  Although it was a charter flight, the journey home was horrible. First of all because of the time difference. Moscow is two hours ahead. You get a short day when you fly out there and a long one coming back. The first team travel in first class, a privilege not shared by the youngsters competing in the Youth League.

  The seats don’t convert completely into beds, but they are comfortable. The table is big enough for a good flight menu and to put the iPad on it after dinner. We have just discussed the game with the coaches, but not in great depth. It’s still so fresh and the emotions from the match remain present. At this stage of the season everyone in the squad has played except the third goalkeeper. We have stayed in tune with our style but can improve. The players have been more focused since the transfer window shut. We’re second in the league. Our record in all competitions reads six wins, two draws.This season there has been just the one (painful) defeat.

  I am going to have some wine and will try to get some kip. We are going to land in London at 5 a.m., more or less, so I have given them the day off.

  4.

  OCTOBER

  Several challenges lay in store in October. First of all there are four league games, the first of which was against Pep Guardiola’s Manchester City at White Hart Lane, as well as the chance to get back on track in the Champions League away in Germany. The League Cup fourth-round tie is against Liverpool. Along the way, chairman Daniel Levy took the coaching staff on a bu
siness and pleasure trip to the Alps.

  Thursday 29 September. We gave the players the day off on Wednesday, having arrived back, not at 5 a.m. but an hour later from Moscow, and we returned to training today. The majority of the players were exhausted, so we lightened the workload. We staged a 45-minute 11 v 11 match: the substitutes who didn’t feature in the CSKA game, the guys who didn’t travel and some who were coming back from injury like Rose and Dier, against an Under-21s academy side.

  Later I took the opportunity to have a tough chat with Wanyama, because he needs to change some of the things he’s doing on the pitch. It’s interesting, for instance, that he thought that he’d put in a good performance against Boro and CSKA, until we showed him some video clips. Victor is a very special, emotional lad who really takes things to heart, and of whom I’m very fond because there’s a real nobility of spirit in him. When I signed him for Southampton from Celtic, he was just a big, strong baby of 21 years old; giving him a talking-to made me feel bad, but it has to be done. These days, I know which buttons to press and how far I can push him.

  We’re going to carry on doing recovery work with the rest of the squad on Friday, so that they’re in the right physical and mental condition to take on board more details on Saturday – including practising set-pieces, which we think will be important in Sunday’s game. Late fitness tests will determine who’s available: we know that Harry Kane is still out, while Dembélé has a knock on his foot and I don’t think he’ll make it. Hugo Lloris has resumed training with the group.

  *

  Friday 30th. I had my press conference today and the narrative was clear: first against second, with table-topping Manchester City – who have a 100 per cent record and the division’s best attack – up against the league’s meanest defence. Simon Felstein warned me it would be billed as Guardiola v Pochettino, Barcelona v Espanyol, and he was right. English football is in thrall to the cult of personality, which explains why this collective sport is transformed into stories about individuals, why goalscorers are lauded, why anyone who makes a mistake is lampooned, and often deeper analysis is avoided. Every week there’s a different story of ready-made heroes and villains.