How did you get to the Moroccan team?
“In August I was at home, in Vigo. I have been outside Spain since 2010, with Karpin in Moscow, with Luis García Plaza in China, the Emirates and Saudi Arabia, and during the pandemic I decided to return to work at Sporting de Gijón. And I got a call from Luis telling me that the Moroccan coach is training the staff and wants a European physical trainer. I made a plan with him and he trusted me.”
How do you prepare a team in just three months?
“The first thing I did was contact the physical trainers of the clubs to get to know the footballers well and follow the work they do. Not changing anything is the key, adapting to the characteristics of each player of football. In the World Cup the key is rest, recovery processes after the match, the work of physiotherapists and recuperators. As soon as a game ends, straight to the bath of contrasts, supplementation, rest. We rest more in training. Here there is an important aspect that is the teaching of the selective “
Is Regragui more of a psychologist than a coach?
“It’s great. He knows the Moroccan soccer player very well, he became a soccer player and became a staff in 2012. He was key in recruiting soccer players and in creating this family that is Morocco. It gave the footballers a lot of freedom, we didn’t set up activities or anything like that. The Moroccan Federation invited the mothers, the brothers, and the days after the game they came to the concentration. It was a very family choice, very respectful of mothers, it gives them strength to be with their loved ones”
How will they get to the semi-final against France?
“Tired. But where the forces do not reach the heart comes. The Morocco team plays with the soul. When the lung capacity is not enough to make a final spring, the soul and feeling of a supporting team appears and plays for something more than football”
Luis Enrique impressed with Morocco’s number 8, Ounahi.
“He is an incredible footballer, with a lot of talent, a lot of quality. You see him as fragile and he runs more kilometers than others and with meaning. He is like a child, he is not afraid of anything. He is brave , self-confidence and everything to learn from the talent he has, he always demands the ball…. I am also very impressed with Sofiane Boufal, powerful, with an amazing vision of the game, character and personality”
How did you experience the game against Spain?
“From the Spanish team I know Marco Asensio, with whom Karpin is my coach. It is special. The coach asked the Spaniards, both the coach Joan Solla, a Galician like me who is on the staff of Olympique de Marseille, and the players playing in Spain to isolate themselves. I remember when we won the game I was running across the field and Luis Enrique came over to shake my hand. Many people called me to congratulate me, so many years in the world of football and here we are, in the semifinals of a World Cup”.
The RCD Espanyol family is especially happy…
“After ten years in Vigo, I worked with Lotina in Spanish. I arrived with my Volkswagen and it was like leaving town and finding a family there. We finished fifth, we won the Copa del Rey… I have great friends; Tommy Nkono, Tintin Márquez, Edu Mauri, Rafa Ramos from the press… how happy I am at Barcelona”
Source: La Verdad
I am Shawn Partain, a journalist and content creator working for the Today Times Live. I specialize in sports journalism, writing articles that cover major sporting events and news stories. With a passion for storytelling and an eye for detail, I strive to be accurate and insightful in my work.
