Your road to the Camp Nou has been very long.
Yes, it’s an interesting story (laughs). Barça, Espanyol, Madrid… and many other teams. There was a moment, when I was 21, I was at Mallorca and I believed I wouldn’t have many chances to do better. I wasn’t managing to get out of the Segunda B world and I thought I couldn’t do this for a living. You start thinking about a lot of things then. Not leaving football, but only doing it as a way of entertaining yourself and nothing more. But fortunately, I decided to go to Almería and everything changed there.
You’ve suffered many disappointments and you’ve always moved forward.
When I was young it didn’t bother me when I saw that doors kept being shut in my face. You see that you still have time. When you get to a certain age things change. I never thought of quitting altogether, despite going through some tense moments that you think are unfair and you think “Damn! Why should I keep working? If I’m working at 150% and the other guy gets 20 more opportunities than I do?” But that’s always happened and will keep happening. Some people have to give much more to make it and others give half of that and it’s enough. I saw that everything was getting complicated and when I got to Almería I thought: “This is the last chance to go full out and prove what I have.” If that hadn’t worked out I don’t know where I would have been now.
Now you’re back at Barça after the club let you go when you were a youngster, just like it happened to Alba, who was your teammate.
Yes, I was at La Masia for a year as an Infantil player and they let me go after that season. Before the Brunete tournament, they did a selection to see which kids go. And from all the kids in the team just two ended up not going: one of them was me. I saw I wouldn’t have much of a future here (laughs), at least not with that coach.
You also played for Espanyol…
Yes, first I went for a year to Real Madrid, but it was difficult because I didn’t play at all. And I was at Espanyol the longest, three years, but it’s like I wasn’t even there. I never wore the shirt because they kept loaning me out. So I have no feeling towards them, neither good or bad.
And when you see that no one counts on you at any club isn’t it easier to let go and give it up?
After Barça and Madrid, I didn’t think that everything ended there. I was very young. I played good seasons after that, but you see that you get no reward and that’s when I decide to break the pattern a bit and I go to Greece. I was 17. Why Greece? Paco Herrera was in Espanyol’s technical secretary and he told me that it was a good option even though I was still young. It was the Greek first division and I didn’t play a lot there either. I returned here and could sign for La Pobla de Mafumet (act like a reserves team for Gimnàstic de Tarragona) when there was just half an hour left until the market closed. I played a great season in Tercera. But they didn’t allow me to do the preseason with Nàstic so I left. Where? To Mallorca. In Segunda B.
And then you got to Almería.
Yes, yes… I said: “OK, I’m going there, but only if you allow me to play the preseason with the first team. If not, I’m staying home. This is where it ends.” Luckily they agreed. And that was when I met Lucas Alcaraz. And that changed everything. My career kept going downhill and all of the sudden it started going uphill. I couldn’t get any lower (laughs). And I can’t get any higher now either. I’m at Barça. Now I want to win titles.
Alcaraz changed your life.
Obviously. I don’t even know what word to choose. Yes, he’s my hero, the person who had full confidence in me and that allowed me to show everything that I was because I was settled. It’s true that, in the end, everyone has what he does on his own merits. But it’s also true that if I hadn’t had met him, I probably wouldn’t be here. I’m sure I wouldn’t be here.
It was your last chance.
Yes, my last shot. I knew it. And it worked out. I don’t know if there’s someone up there in the sky who did me justice. I’m not that different a person from others. There’s probably lots of people who went through what I did or even worse. Until I was 22 everything was just work to try and move up and the road was always downhill. And since I got to Almería everything changed, it’s all been good, it’s all been happiness and I hope it keeps going like this.
You’ve been persistent and had lots of trust in yourself.
I wanted to play a preseason to prove my level. That’s why I was insisting at every club I went to. But they wouldn’t even give me that chance. I knew there were other good players, but I also knew that I was confident and that I had a good level. If I wouldn’t have been good enough I would have said: “OK, you’re a Segunda B player, not a Primera or a Segunda one.” I would have owned up to that. You’ll play until you retire and then you’ll live from something else. But I wanted to prove my level. I knew that I was better than where I was playing.
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