Tata: “Rotations go out of the window before a big game”

Former Barcelona coach and the current Argentina coach Gerardo ‘Tata’ Martino gave his views on this Sunday’s crunch meeting between his former club and Real Madrid. Tata’s rotation policy worked well for him at Camp Nou but said that such measures “go out of the window” ahead of big games like ‘El Clásico’.

"At a club like Barcelona, the coach will find out a lot about himself very quickly – you can’t hide anything from the squad and on top of that, you have to form a team in line with the characteristics of the team you’ll be facing each week. So when you do rotate the squad, it’s important to make sure that all of the players feel comfortable and motivated but that goes right out of the window when you’re facing a big game,” he told Europa Press. “Players might tell you, ‘this is how it works here, rotations are all well and good but in crucial game, this is what the team should be’. And that continues right the way through the season. Players will say things like, ‘I didn’t play against Real Madrid in Week 10 which means that I won’t be playing in the big games’”.

Tata also recognized that he was very self-critical when he left the Barça job. “I try to be critical with myself. After that, it’s all down to what conclusion you reach but nor am I going to disguise it if I know myself that I have made errors. The difference at Barça is that everything you say gets published. At other clubs coaches might prefer to keep their mouths shut”.

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