29.12.2010 12:27

Amor and Puig, the youth structure managers

Jaume Marcet

The Director of Sport and Youth Football, Guillermo Amor, and the Coordinator of the Youth Football Area,Albert Puig,have spoken to Barça TV about how the Barça youth teams are being managed through such a brilliant period for the club.

Having been working at their jobs since July of this year, Guillermo Amor and Albert Puig have spoken about what they have been doing with the youth teams right the way down from Juvenil B to Prebenjamí.

Positive changes

“Our lives have changed, but in a positive sense” says Albert Puig, while Guillermo Amor confesses that “I am thankful every day. For who we are, where I am, what we represent, for how happy it makes us, we are very proud. We have a huge, enormous responsibility, but what we do is very nice, especially because we’re working for the future, and sewing the seeds little by little”.

A challenge ahead

For Albert Puig, who until last year coached Infantil B at Barça, coordinating the whole youth system “is a very nice challenge … I can contribute ideas, along with Guillermo, we can change the youth system, things I have experienced here for eight years as a coach, and things that I have always felt could be changed.” “We are fully dedicated to it”, adds Guillermo Amor.

Hand in hand

Amor and Puig form a duo that works together. “We speak every day and decide on ways of acting. I think we have the same ideas, we follow the same paths” says Albert Puig. Amor adds that “if there is one thing that leads you to success it’s working as a team, doing things together. Not just us, but all the coaches and all of the other people involved in the youth system”.

World recognition

These are moments of splendour for FCB, with three home-produced players opting for the FIFA Ballon d’Or –Iniesta, Xavi and Messi. Albert Puig claims that people from many countries and different clubs and federations have come to the Ciutat Esportiva Joan Gamper to see if they can learn from Barcelona’s successful methods.

Work is the key

Puig also says that “we do not have the formula for success. At the end of the day, it comes down to working along the same lines and all of the different components working hard at it every day.” Guillermo Amor agrees that “we have to work the same way, but always staying humble and not thinking we are better than anybody else”. Warns Puig “everyone is watching us, and that means we have to work twice as hard, and we have to do all we can to ensure that Pep Guardiola and Tito are always happy with the quality of the footballers we are supplying them with”.

Guardiola the centrepiece

Both Amor and Puig have nothing but praise for Barça first team manager Josep Guardiola. “We have the best coach the youth system could wish for. He has shown us on a daily basis that he is the kind of coach that likes to put his faith in the youth structure”, explains Puig. “That’s because he was just 13 or 14 years old when he came to Barça, he has lived at La Masia, he knows how important it is, he knows what it does to train up players, he was the captain of the Dream Team, we are so lucky that he then came here as a reserve team coach, so he knows all about the youth system. He completes the cycle”.

“Pep is Barça”

Amor agrees with everything Puig says. “Pep is Barça. He knows it all. He has plenty of relations with us. He trusts the people below him and I am sure he will continue to do so. The doors to the first team are wide open right now, because he is the ideal man for the job … There could be nothing better than for him to stay here a long time, for the good of the club, for results and for the people starting out now. Although he’s a busy man and he’s always travelling with the first team, he always keeps an eye on us, and he doesn’t let a thing pass him by”.

Professional coaches

One of Guillermo Amor and Albert Puig’s gambles has been to make the youth coaches full time professionals. “When we started doing this we thought about extending the hours, and asked how many coaches we needed. The fact is these people need more than 24 hours a day to do their jobs, they are exhausted because they have so much to do. We work on the methodology and on training the coaches as well. There is a lot of work to be done, and that’s important”.

Guillermo Amor is happy with the way the youth coaches “live the club. I can only congratulate them on the work they are doing. They love the club and are dedicated to it. One day, maybe 8, 10, 15, 20 years from here, just like happened with Pep, I’d like all of the coaches to have played for the first team. I think that’s the way forward”.

All teams essential

Albert Puig believes that all of the youth teams are as important as each other. “We have seen over the year that if the littlest ones perform well, then they go up though the ranks well, and the players and the whole system work perfectly … That forms the basis for everything. One of the reasons why this club is so successful is because we attach the same level of importance to the seven-year-old Prebenjamí team as we do to Barça B”.

Patience game

It is outstanding how many young players have risen though the system to ultimately form part of Guardiola’s all-conquering squad. Albert Puig demands “patience with the young players that are now in the first team. People must realise that Xavi, Iniesta and all the others had to go through a process. We don’t expect a player of 18 or 20 to have the same qualities as somebody like Xavi. They need to mature”.

Top quality

Guillermo Amor was another player who came up through the Barça ranks, but he thinks it will be difficult to find players of such amazing quality as those in the current first team. “It won’t be easy. The players we have right now are very good, but as Albert says, everybody needs time … But I am sure new players will emerge, they’ll come through because we are working in the same way and there are a lot of every good quality players waiting to make the jump into the first team”.