Distance Between Lionel Messi and Pep Guardiola Is Dictated by Footballing Life
Ahead of Pep Guardiola's return to Barcelona as Bayern Munich head coach in the Champions League semi-final first leg, here is an extract from my book Messi, which is the first authorised biography of Lionel Messi.
I was fortunate to speak exclusively with Guardiola for his thoughts on the Barcelona star as part of my research.
"Guardiola gradually transmitted the huge excitement that he had generated on arriving at Barcelona, and over time he gained everyone’s trust," Lionel Messi was quoted by UEFA.com as saying.
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"As time went on, everyone became happier at work and there was a new enthusiasm. We could see that things were going well. Guardiola knows an incredible amount about football and he shared his wisdom, so that everything would be easier for us on the pitch."
"Now I live in Munich. I will be there if you need me."
That is how Pep Guardiola let me know he would be available to discuss his years with Lionel Messi, in his own words, for my book, Messi.
A unique era at Barcelona which lasted four seasons, with all the records and the six titles (in one year) which launched Messi into the footballing stratosphere. Football evolved in that period.
That period began with Messi isolated from his good friends and his "adopted" father, and with Guardiola unable to connect with his big star.
It finally ended with a heartfelt hug at the Camp Nou after he scored the fourth goal against Espanyol at the end of Guardiola’s final season.
What was the process of synchronisation? What relationship did they have? Was it the usual coach/player one? Who helped who?
I met Guardiola in Munich at the beginning of September 2013. The season had just started, his reputation was still assured in the eyes of his new audience, the Bayern Munich fans, the German press and the management of his new club.
In fact, Guardiola was altogether in fashion: His first international biography was all over the main bookshops in the city, it was the topic of conversation among the few fans who went to the training ground that day to see a team decimated by the absence of internationals, who were off playing for their national sides.
Everyone was scrambling for his attention. They discussed what Guardiola wanted, what had changed and how complicated it was to improve a team that had already won everything.
At the time, Guardiola was hoping for a game in which the team could show harmony. That match would come soon after, on Oct. 2, 2013, in Manchester against City in the Champions League group stage.
It ended in a 3–1 win and confirmed the Bayern boss had managed to give his players conviction. Not only did they win, but they played as Guardiola had instructed. That is how his new adventure took off.
On the way to his office, a modern, high-ceilinged room with a large stained-glass window opposite his desk, a whiteboard, board pens and carefully arranged DVDs, Guardiola said "Hello" in German to everybody he saw and had little chats with the kitman, with a player, with his secretary. Nobody had to correct his new language. His immersion in the club was beginning.
Seated on one of those rather generic high-backed swivel chairs, Guardiola took a deep breath. As he exhaled, you could almost hear doors closing somewhere in the building.
Shut away from the outside world, he started trawling through the Messi period once again, through those years of victories and anxiety.
Hearing Guardiola speak, it seemed as if his time at Barcelona was like one of those memorable summers: intense, fruitful, one which is remembered with profound melancholy as something irreplaceable that can never be forgotten.
But as our conversation ended, it became clear the relationships created during that period belong solely to that period; they are impossible to recover now they have been left behind.
Messi and Guardiola have only seen each other once since they went their separate ways. A brief greeting and an exchange of pleasantries at the Ballon d’Or gala in early 2013. And that was it.
Leo Messi is a footballer. Pep Guardiola was his coach. Pep did everything for Leo. Leo will be eternally grateful to Pep. But Messi is now on another planet. And maybe Pep is, too.
Not even when Barcelona played a pre-season friendly at the Allianz Arena against Bayern did the two of them cross paths. "I have not seen him," is what Messi said at the time.
It is perhaps more painful for those on the outside looking in, and discovering the distance between them, than it is for the main protagonists themselves.
They will see each other one day, but there doesn't seem to be any rush. But why do these things happen?
Has football made Messi so much tougher that he does not feel the need to share anything with the coach who looked after him so well? Or does Guardiola’s intense hands-on style require a cooling-off period before relations can be resumed, even personal ones?
In order to understand it all and to try to find a response, you have to start at the beginning.
Pep Guardiola: The first time I saw him, I was with Nike, where my brother Pere used to work. Messi was signed to them, too.
We happened to meet in a shop. His father was there as well, and I was introduced to him. He said "Hello" to me, I saw he was shy, we said goodbye: that was the first point of contact.
Sometime after, chatting with Tito Vilanova, he told me he had a fantastic player who was going to break through. Then I found out about his quality, and I started following him on television.
He was spot on. Tito was spot on.
