00:01We'll take a show of hands for questions please with mics on the other side of the room.
00:04We'll set an embargo partway through for 10.30pm this evening.
00:08We'll start with Stuart.
00:11Hi Pep, can we just start with any team news?
00:14Is there any news on Rodri and how long he'll be out for?
00:19I don't know. Not yet, not ready for tomorrow.
00:24Kovacic came back in the international break.
00:26Has he now got a chance to feature for the first time?
00:30It's good news.
00:31Let's start at 50-60 minutes.
00:33Step by step.
00:34He has to give us now quality moments, quality time, quality minutes.
00:40Step by step.
00:41It's important that he's back.
00:43And Mamouche and Nouri?
00:47Yeah, they trained yesterday and they are much, much better.
00:51Yeah, they are close to come back.
00:53Just one on this game.
00:55Obviously Jack Grealish can't play because he's ineligible.
00:57But I just wonder what you make of his impact at Everton.
01:02Obviously he's there.
01:04The impact has been massive since day one.
01:07Start playing and back to take minutes and minutes.
01:09And this is what he wanted.
01:10And the appreciation that we have with him because he's a lovely, unbelievable guy.
01:19But for different reasons, he didn't play much minutes and he's back to real business.
01:25He's playing every game.
01:26Just on the back of that, what do you think about the rule here where loan players aren't allowed to play against their parent clubs?
01:38Rules.
01:43Should they be changed where players are eligible to play?
01:47The moment I will be a CEO or president for running a big institution in England, maybe I will change it.
01:53But that if they would play, it would be nice.
01:57If they don't play, it's because of the rules.
02:00To be honest, I don't have an opinion.
02:04Have you spoken to Jack since he's been?
02:06No, yeah, when he left.
02:08But since then, hopefully tomorrow if he comes to Etihad, I can see him.
02:13And just on Nico, Nico O'Reilly has been nominated for the Golden Boy Award.
02:20Does he highlight how well he's been doing here since he broke through?
02:24Absolutely.
02:26The days we played, the players are really in high level.
02:28But he's always a young player who has to be attention and be careful about the compliments and recognition in the words.
02:34Because being downed, you know, stable mentally is the most important thing today in modern football.
02:41Because the sustained, what we would like in the young players, can make a career about 10 to 15 years.
02:48And it's not possible when your mind is up and down, up and down.
02:51You have to be stable.
02:52But Nico O'Reilly is a really, really stable guy.
02:56And it's really, really important, especially went to the national team with Thomas for the first time.
03:01Before he didn't play, but being there already at an early age is massively important for him.
03:07Hi, Pep.
03:08You've probably seen the quotes or the words from your former colleague, Carlos Planchard,
03:13talking about you and the fact that he thinks that maybe at some point you'll need to have a break so you can regenerate.
03:19I just wondered what you made of what he said and whether you're doing it.
03:22He's right.
03:23Yeah.
03:24But in 2035, I will start to think about it.
03:29He's obviously a performance analyst, so he knows what he's talking about in many respects.
03:33I suppose on the wider conversation about his feeling that a project, any project within football,
03:38should last up to five or six years.
03:40Absolutely.
03:41I think in life, in the best is when you have a new project constantly,
03:45when you do the same for many, many decades and years and centuries.
03:49It's always, you know, it's completely different.
03:52But I think that, as I said many times, that comes naturally.
03:56It comes with the club or in that case, the manager or the players feel it.
04:00So we are not the same like we started 20 years or 30 years or 10 years ago.
04:05We are completely different.
04:06But that is a question of many, many reasons.
04:09And when that happens, it happens in a natural way, especially in that club.
04:12Like the relation I have with since the chairman, since the last person is so, so close
04:19and never will be.
04:21We are incredibly honest with that when we feel that it's moment to, you know,
04:28to make another step for the club, for everyone.
04:32But not just about me.
04:33It's just about, you know, how many people for the backroom staff
04:36or even my assistant coaches, they left.
04:39So it's normal.
04:40Everyone has his own desires and own wishes.
04:45And that is normal.
04:46So now I am still here in front of you.
04:49So we'll see.
04:50We're grateful for that.
04:52Are you sure?
04:53Absolutely, Pep.
04:54I don't think so.
04:55It's the highlight of my week, as you know.
04:56You are the longest serving manager in the Premier League now.
05:01It's funny that actually Mikel's second obviously used to be under you here.
05:05In terms of your time here, being the longest serving manager, what do you put it down to?
05:11Is it simply a matter of winning trophies?
05:12Is there something else?
05:14What is the reason why you're able to be the longest serving manager?
05:18Well, it's the third question.
05:19You go in that direction.
05:20I have the feeling that you want to suck me.
05:23So you don't want to see me here.
05:26So the reason why I'm fine.
05:28Still, of course, we changed a lot in the last years before, but especially last time.
05:33And still, you know, with the energy that brings me my staff and the new players to try to, you know, to, you know, to, I don't want, I had the feeling in Barcelona, I had the feeling in Munich and now here.
05:49I never would be at the feeling when I had the feeling I'm the problem, I wouldn't make a step aside.
05:53So I wouldn't be a problem.
05:55But still I had the feeling that I want to, the energy to fill the team with the players to, you know, make simply better season than last season.
06:04And this is my, my target.
06:06As I never, I'm sitting here in the beginning, these stages, October, November, December, going to win this.
06:10I wanted to win that.
06:11So honestly, I don't know.
06:12I don't know what's going to happen tomorrow against Everton.
06:15So that the truth is that before internationalized international break, we are far away from the top of the league.
06:20And now we are closer and we want to continue there and arrive in the last stages of the competition.
06:24You know, the competitions being close.
06:27This is, I would say, the target I have.
06:30And what I said, I see things that we are doing much, much, much better than happened, especially last season.
06:39And in every game, we are a little bit better and better.
06:42And this is, I have the margin that we can do better in many, many aspects.
06:47And that made me, give me the energy that is not the job done.
06:53It's completely unfinished business.
06:55And that's why I'm here.
06:57Yeah.
06:57Hi, Pep.
06:58Erling seems to have maintained his form throughout the international break.
07:02And he's now got a great chance of going to the World Cup.
07:05So his confidence is sky high, I'd imagine.
07:08And I know he's been brilliant for you throughout his time here.
07:10But is this the best shape you can remember him being in?
07:16Well, yeah, I think it is.
07:19So, yeah, it feels really good.
07:22And the performance level, not just in terms of goals, in many things, is outstanding.
07:26And, yeah.
07:28So, what I'm saying is we're going to drop.
07:31It is impossible to sustain that.
07:33I will be there.
07:34We will be there.
07:35So, we have this passion to help the team and do it.
07:41Always have to sustain it at bad moments.
07:42Now, it doesn't need compliments and doesn't need anything special.
07:46But it's really good because, of course, for him, for Norway, for a long time,
07:50don't go big competition.
07:51I think it's 94, maybe.
07:53It's the last time when they come back.
07:55You have one game away, you know, to go to the World Cup in the States.
07:59For him, for Norway, of course, for his mates, it's really, really nice and really important.
08:05Yeah, would you say Norway's form has put a spring in his step, really?
08:09An extra boost of confidence that he maybe didn't have?
08:13Norway's form and results, has that given him an extra spring in his step?
08:18But the year of the travel that he scored, I don't know how million goals he scored.
08:22Norway was not maybe in the top and he scored a lot of goals here.
08:25So, of course, Dan Legere revitalized when you score and you play good.
08:29The next game, you approach the next game being better.
08:33And that is good.
08:35Bill.
08:36Hi, Pep.
08:37Josko Vardio played twice during the international break.
08:41He's one of the players that play the most minutes for club and country in the entire world.
08:46I just want to know what your thought process is when you've got a player like that,
08:50how conscious you are of the amount of minutes he plays and how you manage that situation.
08:54Yeah, he's young, he's physicality, but we cannot forget last season was maybe one of the most important players for the terms of play, play, play, and play.
09:05And with the problems that we had, and after that he suffered in the preseason, at the end of the season, the World Cup, or at the beginning of the season, have problems with some injuries.
09:17Because with the needs, he's now getting better.
09:19He's so young, physicality is outstanding.
09:22He can play in two roles perfectly, but always spoke together that I have a, from my point of view, leave a margin, a big, big margin to improve as a player.
09:33But he's incredible, perfectly coachable, he's a top-top guy, and listens a lot, and wants to improve, and that is, that will help him to be a better player.
09:46When no one player at that age thinks, what you have to tell me, I know everything, that is difficult, and he's completely opposite.
09:53He can play left-back, he can play centre-back, he's played centre-back more recently.
09:59Where do you see his role in that back-forth?
10:01Both sides.
10:02Both sides.
10:04I think he can play both.
10:06He can do good in both sides, he can do better in both sides.
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