Luis Fernandez knows Mauricio Pochettino, the Argentinian coach who has just been appointed to the PSG bench.

He had made him his captain in the capital in the early 2000s when he coached the Parisian team.

"It's a club with which he wants to achieve something big," he said Wednesday on Europe 1.

INTERVIEW

Nearly 20 years ago, Luis Fernandez, then coach of Paris Saint-Germain, made the Argentinian Mauricio Pochettino his captain in the capital club.

Last Saturday, the latter in turn landed on the PSG bench to replace Thomas Tuchel.

And according to Luis Fernandez, who has "always kept in touch" with his former player, Mauricio Pochettino has great ambitions at PSG.

"It's a club with which he wants to achieve something big," said the former French international Wednesday on Europe 1.

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"He has always been attached to this club"

Luis Fernandez says he spoke on the phone with Mauricio Pochettino no later than ten days ago.

"What he told me about Paris Saint-Germain is that he has always been attached to this club. He has always loved this club. He has always appreciated this passage he had at the time, when I had the opportunity to have him under my command ", he reports.

"We kept a good relationship with him and me."

For Luis Fernandez, having been PSG captain "gives a particular motivation" to the new Parisian coach.

"He is motivated. He wanted to, he had this club in mind," he says.

The Argentine coach already has a good career.

After Spain where he led Espanyol Barcelona, ​​then Southampton and Tottenham across the Channel, "he did not think long" to join PSG "when the opportunity arose".

"He knows very well that it is a club with a lot of potential, of quality, to achieve something big".

"The results will be important"

On the other hand, the former coach of PSG believes that "we will wait a little" before considering the Argentine as the man for the job.

At first, "we will simply try to welcome it, to be happy," he said.

"The results will be important. It's up to him to set up, to make it as simple as possible and to be as efficient as possible in his new function".

In any case, the wait is great on the side of the Parisian supporters who hope to see their club finally take a step forward by winning the Champions League.

"Mauricio recovers a group where he had, for his first or second training session, to integrate young people from the training center, because most [of the players] were injured. Here it is, now for him to recover them as quickly as possible to get his team to go for the Champions League this year, "concludes Luis Fernandez.