Guardila: I loathe 'rubbish' tiki-taka

In a new book profiling the work of the former Barca boss, journalist Marti Perarnau reveal’s his true feelings about the ‘tiki-taka’ football he became synonymous with in his time at the Camp Nou.

“I loathe all that passing for the sake of it, all that tiki-taka. It’s so much rubbish and has no purpose. You have to pass the ball with clear intention and aim to make it into the opposition’s goal. It’s not about passing for the sake of it,” he is quoted as saying.

Guardiola was speaking after his Bayern Munich team had played Nurnberg in a bad-tempered match, and expanded on the theme with his players the following day.

“Be yourselves. You need to dig into your own DNA. I hate tiki-taka, which means passing the ball for the sake of it with no clear intention. It’s pointless.

“Don’t believe what people say. Barca didn’t do tiki-taka! It’s completely made up! Don’t believe a word of it!

“In all team sports the secret is to overload one side of the pitch so the opponent must tilt its defence to cope. You overload on one side to leave the other side weak.

“When we’ve done all that, we attack and score from the other side. That’s why you need to pass the ball, but only if you are doing it with a clear intention.

“It’s just to overload the opponent, to draw them in and hit them with a sucker punch.

“That’s what our game needs to be. Nothing to do with tiki-taka,” he insisted.

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