The 33-year-old coach discusses the differences between working in Europe and the US, losing the NWSL Championship final and moving abroad for the first time
After spending all of your career coaching in Spain, since June you have been coaching in the American NWSL, as the head coach of Washington Spirit. Thinking more broadly about the NWSL, what differences have you observed in style of play in this league, compared to European football? “Yes, being honest, it’s different. I think in Spain and Europe, regarding tactical plans, there is a high, high level, and here it is very entertaining, because the style of play [here] is thinking ‘what do I have to do to give my best to the supporters and make the people enjoy?’ Only 25-30% of the games here are won by a difference of two goals. The rest of the games, there’s only one goal difference. That means that the league is very competitive. So this is very difficult if you compare it with my past with Barcelona in Spain because most of the games we won 4-0, 5-0, 6-0, easy, and in Europe other games too, but the level of tactics was very, very high. Here the level of the player is high too but everything is related to the entertainment. It’s more physical, more direct, transitions, chances, not too much control. I am trying to change it a little bit. I want to increase the entertainment, for sure, but I want to reduce the transitions and have more control in the games.”
At the end of your first half-season in charge of Washington Spirit you reached the NWSL Championship final but ultimately lost 1-0 to Orlando Pride in the final game of the season in November. As a coach, how long does it take for you to get over a narrow defeat like that, when the trophy was so close? “You need days, weeks, because I consider myself a very competitive person, and I don’t like to lose. But when you are analysing what you did well, what you can improve for the next season, you have to be proud of the project and the way that you are doing so far, because there are other amazing teams in the league. We beat the [defending] Championship team, Gotham, we got in a better position than Kansas and Portland, North Carolina, teams that have the experience and are doing a good job in the last seasons.”
Overall, then, how would you reflect on your time at the club so far since you arrived in June, on the pitch? “We arrived late, for sure, in the middle of the season, in June. [We had] to compete from the beginning in important games. But we wanted to compete in every single game and try to win. I don’t like to say things like ‘ok, I need one, two, three years’ – that’s very easy, that’s very simple. For me it’s ‘Ok, that’s the situation, that’s the roster, that’s the training session, that’s the facility, that’s the staff. This is everything that we have to have. After ending the season, I was not happy of course, because we lost the final and got second position but, seeing the big picture, I think we did a good job and we have to be proud of it.”
Tactically, would you say your tactical approach is different with Washington Spirit compared to the tactics you deployed at your former club, Barcelona, where you won the Women’s Champions League two times in a row? “This is a good question. When I tell the people that I am doing the same things, people are surprised. I’ll explain to you why. The only things that I’m doing differently are the contents that I use to carry out with the players, but the game-model is the same. When we have the ball possession, when we don’t have the ball possession, or take communication between the players, it’s the same. I understand that here I have other types of players, other characteristics of players, so what I try to do is to use that, and the way that I want to attack and defend is different, but the methodology is the same. I don’t have Patri [Patricia Guijarro], I don’t have Aitana [Bonmati], I have other players. I am not speaking about ‘better or worse’. Other ones. So what I have to do as a coach is exploit their level as much as possible to make sure they compete at the highest-possible level. But in terms of methodology, my methodology is exactly the same as I was doing in Barca.”
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