Quique Setién (Santander, September 27, 1958) is chosen to relieve Ernesto Valverde on the Barça bench. In the retina of many Barca fans, sure, there is still the exhibition he signed with Betis at the Camp Nou last season. The Verdiblanco team, with a very high pressure, three centrals and a blatantly offensive game, achieved a tight 3-4 win at the end. Two goals from Leo Messi and one from Arturo Vidal made up things a bit for the locals. Many, then, envied the ways of the Betics. To such an extent, that the name of Setién , struck down by the Heliopolis club in May of last year, already came to sound like a possible Valverde relief if the Barcelona players fell in the final of the Copa del Rey. Seven and a half months later, that option has already become a reality.

In recent months, the name of Quique Setién , the last visiting coach capable of winning at the Camp Nou, has been planning over several benches with tightrope technicians, such as Villarreal de Javi Calleja and, even, curiously, Rubi's Betis. No option, however, came to fruition and the Cantabrian will now have the opportunity to lead a club that had been in his sights for a long time. Not surprisingly, Johan Cruyff has always been one of his great references. He likes to attack, either with four defenses, just as he started in Betis, or with three, with that 'ajacied' seal of influence that he likes so much in the Barca surroundings. As a player, he defended the Racing jerseys, in two stages, Atlético, Logroñés and Levante. As coach, his debut was already brilliant: he took command of Racing, which he had joined as general sports director at the beginning of the 2001-02 season, after the dismissal of Gustavo Benítez and took the team to Primera to return immediately to offices. A sweet taste that was followed by two bitter drinks: his dismissal as a coach of the Poli Ejido in the 2003-04 campaign, after achieving only two wins in 15 games, and a very brief stage as coach of Equatorial Guinea, in which only He led a meeting, as he would explain later, due to the lack of seriousness of the sports leaders of that country.

His next experiences, in Lugo, Las Palmas and Betis, would be characterized by a series of ups and downs that would culminate in the first two cases with his voluntary departure from the club and a dismissal without palliatives in the second, however much the verdiblancos were capable to be imposed on Barça and Real Madrid both at the Camp Nou and at the Bernabéu. His ideas have always been very clear. But not for that reason completely non-negotiable. "I am not arrogant, and in fact my coaching staff has an enormous influence on me, I usually surround myself with people much smarter than me because it is the way to renew, to move forward," the technician confessed in an interview granted to EL MUNDO last Month of May. A conversation in which he also confessed that he had a little abandoned his other great passion: chess. So much so that he even had the chance to play games with two great masters: Anatoly Karpov and Garri Kasparov .

They are not the only two idols that Quique Setién had the opportunity to meet in person. Much more rocambolesca was the way he exchanged a few words with one of the great stars of football: Pelé . As the new Barca coach confessed in an interview with El Periódico, he saw him at a night out, late in the morning, taking advantage that he could not play a game with Atlético by penalty. At the end, he armed himself with courage and approached to ask for an autograph, explaining that he was also a footballer. "And if you play football, what are you doing at this time in the disco?", The Brazilian star would answer. A whole jug of cold water. Something that, of course, with the perspective of time, remembers now with a smile on the lips.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

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  • Real Madrid
  • Arturo vidal
  • Ernesto Valverde
  • Leo Messi
  • sports
  • FC Barcelona

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