Yaya Touré, Ivorian coach currently working as assistant coach for Saudi Arabia national team, and formerly a centre-back at teams like Barcelona and Manchester City, has slammed Pep Guardiola, whom he worked with at Barcelona and Manchester, calling him “a snake”.
Touré felt disrespected by Guardiola at Barcelona between 2009 and 2010, who favoured Sergio Busquets, and only played nine matches in the starting line up in his last season, before being sold to Manchester City in 2010. There, he became one of the most important players of the squad… until Pep Guardiola arrived in 2016, and once again Touré was benched. Their bad relationship continued until Touré left in 2018 and joined Olympiacos.
Touré’s agents and himself have publicly criticised Guardiola many times: in 2018, as recalled by Marca, Touré said that he wanted to be “the one to break the Guardiola myth: “I have the impression that he was jealous, he took me for a rival, that he did everything to spoil my last season. He was cruel with me“, and suggested that it had something to do with race: “It got to the point I asked myself if it was because of my colour. I’m not the first, other Barcelona players asked the question too“.
“I don’t see a man, I see a snake”
Eight years later, Yaya Touré, now 42, spoke again about Guardiola on the ZACK YouTube channel (via Daily Mail), saying that “I don’t see a man, I see a snake“.
Recalling the moment where he left to Manchester City, Touré said: “The Barcelona coach calls me back then and says, “You have to come back, it’s important.” My wife says to me, “Are you going to listen to that nonsense? He treated you like dirt, and now he wants you to stay, and you’re going to stay? Let’s go to Manchester“.
“The guy didn’t play me all year, and at the end of the year, I shine at the World Cup (2010), and he brings me to Barcelona. My wife would tell me about him. “Sheytan, he’s not a man, he’s wicked.” She sees him as a negative person.’“
Yaya Touré never fixed his relationship with Pep Guardiola. The Spanish coach, before Touré’s final game with City in 2018, said that Touré was “one of the most important players in the club’s history“.
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