You know, when I reference Pep, I always have to talk with my hands. I have to find a table, or a board or something and I have to start moving around coffee cups like a chess board, like he does.
“He will go here, then he will go there, and then bang — you move here. Into the space. Bang.”
For me, he added that final mental piece of the puzzle. “Seeing” the game in a different way. “Feeling” it — when to move into space, when to hold back. When to press, when to ease off. His confidence was so important to me, because you have to remember, when I came here in 2019, I was walking into a changing room with Fernandinho, Agüero, David Silva, Kevin De Bruyne. Legends.
When I was 12 years old, I used to go and watch Agüero on the training ground when he was at Atlético. He was one of my heroes. Now I’m sitting right next to him in the changing room? It was amazing.
Agüero and Otamendi actually used to make fun of me all the time — not just for my clothes, but because I used to get on the bus after every match and FaceTime my missus. Since I’m a footballer and she is a doctor, we had to get used to being long-distance for many years.
What do you do when you’re long-distance? You FaceTime. I’d call her after every game, win or lose. When we won, it was no problem, because the boys would be rowdy and celebrating and they wouldn’t notice.
Read Rodrigo’s full essay in The Players’ Tribune
But when we lost, I was still just my normal self. I had no filter. When I speak to my missus, it’s like my brain flips back to being in uni. I become Rodrigo again. So it would be dead silent on the bus, everyone with their heads down, all depressed, and I’d be talking loudly, saying, “Yeah, we were a bit s*** today, to be honest. Yeah, yeah, we drew. Yeah, I’m pissed…. Anyway, how was your day?”
The first time, Agüero and Otamendi pulled me aside and they said, “Man, you can’t be talking like that on the bus! Pep can hear you! Everyone can hear you!”
But after every match, I would call her. No filter.
“Yeah, it was OK today. We won, but I played kind of s***. Are you watching Netflix? What are you eating?”
Hahahah. We were like two teenagers. Everyone was so annoyed. They would be trying to grab the phone from me: “He will call you back! Rodri, hang up the phone! He has to go now! Bye-bye!”
They wanted to kill me, but I didn’t care. When I leave the pitch, my goal is to always make sure that my feet are on the floor. I think sometimes people misunderstand that part of me. Obviously, as footballers, there is so much marketing and media that you become a kind of character. For me, it’s “the nerd.” I remember I had to do a photo shoot one time, and they said, “Hey, you know what would be cool? Put these books under your arm. Pretend that you’re going to the library.”
When the photos came out, I had my friends from school texting me, “Come onnnn, man. Are you serious? What is this s***? You don’t even like to read! You’re not a real nerd!”
Don’t always believe what you see on social media! Reality is always more complicated.
We have been very blessed the last few years with City, but it’s not real life. In the good moments, you don’t learn, you just enjoy.
In the bad moments, when you truly suffer, that’s when you really grow. I remember after the ’21 Champions League final against Chelsea, I walked back into the little family area, and when I saw my parents and my brothers, I literally couldn’t speak.
It was like I was 10 years old again, at the kitchen table. I couldn’t say a word. I just thought: I never want to feel this feeling again. I have to work harder. I have to find a way to be better.
