BarcelonaHow hard it is to say goodbye. Gerard Piqué, who has always wanted to control his destiny, decided to use social networks with an emotional video that he had prepared with the people of his company, Kosmos, months ago. The centre-back wanted to have the video ready for when the time came and, in fact, months ago he had already shared on social networks some of the old digitized videos in which he appears dressed as a Barça player at the age of 4. Videos that he was preparing for when the day came to say that he quits. He didn’t tell his colleagues the day before, at the fraternity dinner in Can Ferran. I knew that news flies and leaks these days. And Piqué, as he had done when he announced to the world that he was dating Shakira, wanted to be the one to break the news. His video, in fact, has already become one of the most viewed contents in the Catalan language around the world in history.
Barça has dismissed its heroes in a thousand ways. And they have not always chosen the way to leave, since sometimes it was the management who took the floor, as in the case of Maradona. From the old announcements on teletypes, to a video on the internet. From black and white to colours, but with the same Barcelona essence, a club where the relationship between the offices and the dressing room have not always been easy. All the great legends of the club have said goodbye with a certain bitter aftertaste, as it is very difficult to manage the end of the career of athletes who have given so much, but who must leave. Small wounds that time heals. The new generation, however, seems to have learned something from the past: if you can say goodbye by guaranteeing a packed Camp Nou farewell, all the better. These are unique moments that not all the big names in Barcelona have had. Piqué, as Xavi and Iniesta did recently, says goodbye guaranteeing himself a day of glory at the stadium. Most of the myths of Barcelona have until now followed the same script: talk with the board first, with the teammates in the dressing room later and organize a press conference to make official what everyone already imagined. Piqué, who has always shown an interest in new ways of communicating, has chosen to follow a different path.
Kubala, a double farewell
The goodbyes explain the eras in which they pass and the personalities of the protagonists. When Samitier decided to leave for Madrid in 1933 in charge of the board, he did so by speaking personally to the press at the door of the club’s offices, for example. The great Ladislau Kubala, a passionate man with an innocent point, did not control the message. Even before the first final of the European Cup played by Barça, on May 31, 1961 in Bern, the city knew that the Hungarian was thinking of hanging up his boots. But between the final, lost, and the fact that a week later there were elections for the presidency of the club, the official farewell was postponed, which would arrive at the first meeting of the board of directors chaired by Enric Llaudet. The withdrawal was confirmed on the same day that he was chosen as director of the Barça football school and it was agreed to play a tribute match on June 30. Kubala, however, would soon end up as coach of the Blaugrana first team and, annoyed by the management’s treatment, would leave for Espanyol to recover his football career for a few months, a decision he communicated to the press in the street, outside of the Camp Nou, when he was getting ready. Those were other times.
Guardiola, a lonely farewell
Pep Guardiola, for his bada, was one of the first to choose to say goodbye in a press conference saying the words he was so sorry to pronounce, instead of letting it be a press release from the club who gave the news. It was April 2001 and the relationship of the then player with the most titles at Barça with Joan Gaspart’s management was bad. The footballer from Santpedor, after discussing it with his parents and some friends, communicated it to the president in a meeting. The next morning, before training on the field that used to be next to the old Masia, at Camp Nou, he gathered his teammates to break the news. The press, present a few meters away, understood that something was happening when it became known that the midfielder would speak in a press conference in a room where he had never spoken and which was reserved for coaches, until then. “I arrived when I was 13, now I’m 30 and I’m a family man. The career is slipping through my fingers and I want to finish it abroad getting to know new countries, new cultures and new leagues,” he said in a press conference where he symbolically appeared alone, without anyone from the board. Gaspart was abroad on a trip that morning. “It is something that has been meditated for a long time. And when I put things on the scale and see what remains for me to discover and to teach from what I have learned here, I opt for this decision. It was not easy to choose the moment to announce- yes. At Barça there is always news and matches every three days. But I have to start thinking about my future,” Guardiola would say. He was right. It costs a lot to choose the moment.
Puyol, Xavi and Iniesta, in a press conference
Carles Puyol, for his part, chose to announce it in a press conference in March 2014. There had already been reports about his future for months, since he was suffering from injuries and could not recover his best level of play. Official confirmation was lacking, however, and when the club announced a surprise press conference from the captain just before training in the sports city, everyone understood why. Gerard Piqué was there, in the first final. “After the last two very aggressive operations, it is very difficult for me to recover the level that I demand of myself to continue here. More than I thought and much more than the surgeons told me”, he commented, referring to the injury to his right knee that he had suffered for seven months the previous year without being able to play. Puyol did not accept questions then, but he did admit them in an official event at the end of the season.
Andrés Iniesta and Xavi Hernández were also unable to hide for a long time that they were considering leaving the club. Unlike Piqué and Guardiola, his departure did not come as a surprise. Xavi, in fact, had already told some friends that he was leaving the club in 2014, but Luis Enrique convinced him to stay on for another year. And it was a success, as it allowed the Terrasse player to fold after winning the treble, with the Champions League in Berlin in 2015. Shortly before the final against Juve, Xavi organized a press conference at the Ciutat Esportiva to explain the that everyone already knew. “I would like to confirm my departure from Barça. It is a final, difficult decision, and I agreed with my wife, my family and my people. It makes me homesick, but it’s time to go. I think I did well to stay this season”, he said, accompanied by president Josep Maria Bartomeu, who spoke afterwards. Xavi received a tribute in the match on the last day of the league at Camp Nou, of course. In the case of Iniesta, it was at the end of April 2018, when he arrived at the Ciutat Esportiva to announce to the club what they were already waiting for. “Now you can communicate it”, said Iniesta in the morning to the club’s workers. And they automatically started the machinery that had been ready for days. First, a press conference with hundreds of journalists and all their colleagues present. And then, a tribute to Camp Nou on the day of the last league match. “It is a very thoughtful decision, very valued, very thought out on a personal and family scale. After 22 years here I know what it means to be a player of this team. I know the demands and responsibility of being a captain. Be honest with myself and with the club that has given me everything, I understand that my stage ends this year”, he said.
The last goodbye was the worst of all. What hurt the most, with Lionel Messi’s tears. A hard farewell, as the Argentine wanted to continue. And the management would also have preferred that the statement they made was to say that it was renewing, but the economic situation did not allow it. Messi ended up crying in a press conference that he would not have wanted to do, without controlling his destiny. Piqué did control him, and he did it by showing again that he is a different person. A farewell different from the previous myths of Barcelona.
