Chelsea manager Enzo Maresca declined to categorically rule out a future move to Barcelona while emphasising his present focus on the job at Stamford Bridge. Speaking at his pregame press conference ahead of Tuesday night\u2019s heavyweight clash, Maresca underlined that he is \u201cvery happy\u201d where he is and called Chelsea \u201cone of the best clubs in the world.\u201d<\/p>\n
Chelsea\u2019s home form has been mixed this season: just 43% of the 23 Premier League points they have collected so far have come at Stamford Bridge. That backdrop frames a high-profile test against a Barcelona side Maresca described as \u201cspectacular.\u201d<\/p>\n
When asked about the possibility of managing Barcelona in the future, Maresca did not close the door, but stressed his current priorities. \u201cYou know me because you are always in my press conferences. Even when you ask me what\u2019s happening in three-four months, I always say \u2018I don\u2019t know\u2019,\u201d he said. \u201cAt this moment, I\u2019m very happy to be at this huge club, again one of the best clubs in the world, and this is the most important thing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Maresca spoke of his long-term admiration for the Pep Guardiola era at Barcelona. \u201cI decided to be a manager because of the Pep team at Barcelona, years ago.\u201d He added: \u201cI don\u2019t think [any] one can be compared to that Barcelona, to Pep, because I think they changed football in Spain, where every club was trying to play in that way and then Pep moved to Germany, and everyone was trying to play that way in Germany. I think Pep came to England and many clubs tried to do something similar and also England in terms of the international team. I don\u2019t think anyone can be compared to Pep because I think in the last 20-25 years he changed football.\u201d<\/p>\n
Having worked at Manchester City as a coach and assistant under Guardiola, Maresca later became a number one at Parma in 2021 and then led Leicester City back to the Premier League in his only season there before replacing Mauricio Pochettino at Chelsea. He paid tribute to Barcelona\u2019s current iteration under Hansi Flick, noting their domestic treble and Champions League semifinal run, and warned his squad to expect a demanding encounter at Stamford Bridge. \u201cThey do a lot of things very well and it\u2019s a team that always wants initiative, always wants value and we try to do the same on our side.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Maresca refuses to rule out Barcelona, while insisting he is very happy at Chelsea currently ahead.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":4694,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1017,190],"tags":[1047,1089,1087],"class_list":["post-4695","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-barcelona","category-chelsea","tag-champions-league","tag-chelsea-struggles","tag-coaching-change"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4695","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4695"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4695\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/4694"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4695"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4695"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.weplayfpl.com\/news-articles\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4695"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}