Ernesto Valverde Quotes

The hardest thing to coach is scoring goals and creativity.

I know that I'm a natural attacking player. I love to attack. I love to play freely; I love to combine and play through balls. That's the nature of my game.

I think I can improve in my attacking role, I can do more.

If the spaces open up in the attack, then of course I'm willing to take it because I love to get involved; I love to get crosses in. I love to do combinations and just bring a different aspect to our game.

When you play soccer, most of the time you got to get the ball moving, but once you get into that attacking third you gotta' be creative, you gotta' let your talent take over.

When you get into the game you've got be thinking, when I get into the attacking third I'm gonna be freakin' creative.

Before I came to Barcelona, I only thought about one facet of the game: destroying. My qualities were completely defensive, and I wouldn't take responsibility for organising my team's game, our attacks.

I'm quite confident to take people on - if there's a one against one, I'll definitely take it on if I feel I can get a cross in or set someone up.

The main thing is I've tried to get better at everything - that includes the attacking side, being a threat, and taking people on.

I like to create chances, to shoot when I play farther forward, but I also like playing deeper, as you have more time on the ball.

Part of being a Manchester United player under Sir Alex Ferguson, perhaps the most important part of being one of United's attacking players was that when you were in possession, you had to take risks in order to create goal-scoring chances. It was not an option; it was an obligation.

I don't think it's a problem if you play well and don't score, when you are creating chances.

Jorginho is really suitable to the way I like to play. He is a player that has many good sides to him. He wants to work hard, and he's very fast in moving the ball, which is important for us, although there is also Cesc Fabregas, who has the same potential as Jorginho.

There weren't many plays for me. A lot of my stats came off broken plays, or when I didn't allow the options to play out and just took the shot.

I'd say my main quality is keeping the ball and my passing.

It's not just about getting the ball and figuring out every time how you can keep possession, because there are plenty of players who can do that. That's just not how I view my performances. It's about, What can I do to change the game and the attacking aspect of the game?

As I go back and look at the film, if I look at my first year, every time I caught the ball, I was looking to do something.

Scoring goals comes and goes with time, but the most important thing is that we continue creating chances. The entire team must work, and we then have to score goals.

I have to open the game from my position. It's really important to play with the ball.

I'm the type of player who takes risks, so every now and then I'm going to give the ball away. I just have to learn not to do it in silly areas of the pitch.

If you give time and space to players, they will make good decisions and score goals.

As a midfielder, when you have sealed things up at the back, my job is to provide the ammunition for the strikers and forwards, to create opportunities for them.

I do wonder whether the bigger the game is, the more the risks that David Luiz decides to take.

Anytime you get good service to the box, it's always great as an attacking player because it gives you more opportunities to score.

I've never been blessed with height, strength and power so I've had to learn how to play differently from a young age, my game was all based on technique and when I look at players like Xavi and Iniesta they were always players I modelled myself on.