Former Ivorian midfielder Yaya Toure once again took aim at Pep Guardiola, igniting one of the most notable personal rivalries in European football. In an interview with the Spanish channel “Zak”, reported by “Marca”, the former player stated that he was “marginalized and treated like dust” by the coach in Barcelona and Manchester City, and repeated suspicions of discrimination: “Guardiola pretends that he has no problems with black players.”
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The newspaper indicates that the relationship between the two was never healed. Touré reported that his wife viewed the coach as a negative character:
My wife always told me about Guardiola: “He is the devil, not a man, he is evil.”
The Ivorian described the coach’s position as toxic:
– I don’t see a man, I see a snake… He treated me like dirt.
According to Marca, Toure claims that he felt isolated in the Barcelona team, especially after he lost space in front of Sergio Busquets, which led him to play only nine matches as a starter in his final season with the club, before moving to City in 2010. He remembers that even after performing well in the World Cup in South Africa, Guardiola kept him out of the plans.
At Manchester City, the former player says, this pattern was repeated. Although he became one of the main names in the team between 2010 and 2018, Toure reported that he was relegated back to the bench when Guardiola took over in 2016. Marca recalls that even the sporting director, Dimitri Seluk, actually accused the coach: “Guardiola only thinks about himself. He already believes that he is God.”
In another excerpt from the interview, Torre stated that he sought to understand why he was doing so little, and even investigated his physical numbers:
— When I realized they were as good as, or even better, than the younger players, I understood that it wasn’t a physical issue.
The Ivorian says he also considered that his skin color could be a factor:
-I even wondered if it was because of my skin color. I’m not the only one. Some Barcelona players have also questioned this.
Toure concludes by saying that he intends to “break the myth of Guardiola”, whom, according to him, he considered a rival within the team:
-I have a feeling that he did everything he could to ruin my last season at City.