Interesting article courtesy of askmen.com:
I have just found an anecdote that helps explain what makes Barcelona’s coach, Josep Guardiola, special. It appears in A Life Too Short, Ronald Reng’s excellent new biography of his friend Robert Enke, the German international goalkeeper who lay down on the train tracks and committed suicide in 2009. In a book about depression; the Guardiola story is about joy.
It’s told by Victor Valdes, now the longtime owner of Barcelona’s goalkeeping shirt, but who nine years ago was still Enke’s junior rival for the position. Like Enke (and like most goalkeepers), Valdes was obsessive. He didn’t enjoy keeping. He was driven above all by fear of never making mistakes. “You know, between the ages of 8 and 18 there was so much pressure in my life that I couldn’t find peace,” Valdes told Reng (himself a keen and knowledgeable amateur keeper). “The mere thought of next Sunday’s game horrified me. Playing in goal was, to put it mildly, a special kind of suffering.”
Lessons From Guardiola
Valdes was already Barcelona’s established keeper, and a European champion, when Guardiola became the club’s coach in 2008. “Pep” told Valdes that he didn’t just want good players. He wanted players who actually enjoyed soccer. As Valdes recalled for Reng:
"Victor, said Guardiola, if you go on like this, eventually your career will be over and you won’t have enjoyed this wonderful job for a single day because you’re always tense, because success is the only thing you want. Watch some soccer on TV, try to understand the game."
Guardiola transformed the way Valdes experienced his profession. “He taught me to lower the intensity during a game and coldly analyze what was going on rather than just lurking there with grim resolution,” Valdes says.
Reading about Enke, you almost wish he’d met Guardiola!
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