Manchester City’s manager, Pep Guardiola, has confessed that a break from football would “do me good.” The Spaniard expressed his desire to dedicate time to learning French, honing his culinary skills, and playing golf once he steps away from management.
Despite his love for the adrenaline rush of his Premier League job, Guardiola made a surprising admission during an interview with a renowned Spanish chef following his decision to sign a new two-year contract and after his team suffered five consecutive losses. “I want to leave it and go and play golf, but I can’t,” he said.
“A time will come when I feel it’s enough and I’ll definitely stop then,” added the Man City boss. “I’m not going to manage another team. I’m not talking about the long-term future but what I’m not going to do is leave Manchester City and go to another country to do the same thing as I am now.
“I wouldn’t have the energy to do so. I’m still here doing what I am today. But the thought of starting off somewhere else, with all the process of the training and so on… no, no, no! Maybe a national team but that’s different. I should stop, like these chefs that go to other countries, stop and see what we’ve done well and what we could do better and when you’re busy all day day after day you don’t have time to do that. I think stopping would do me good.”
In a candid chat with Marbella-born chef Dani Garcia on his Desmontadito YouTube channel, Guardiola admitted his culinary skills were essentially non-existent, saying he can only whip up fried eggs and chips. However, the Man City manager has plans for self-improvement. “I’m still young and when I stop, there’s several things I want to do,” he said.
“One of them is to learn French, dedicate my free time to myself so I can play golf and then begin to learn how to cook simple things.” Speaking from Tast, the Catalan-inspired eatery he supports in Manchester, Guardiola also opened up about the solitude that comes with managing a football team, especially during tough times.
“The starting point with coping with the problems of defeat would be being with people, your family basically. But no-one can really console the loneliness of the football manager,” he said.
“You have people beside you but the bad decisions, why have I done that, it’s gone wrong because I did this, I didn’t push them enough… the pain of the defeat, you feel it alone. You might have friends around you, but when you close that bedroom door and turn off the light there’s no consolation. You have to let one or two days pass and then start again.”
