Al-Qadsiah is the revelation of the season in Saudi Arabia. The team led by Míchel, which has players such as Nacho Fernández and Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang, is third in the league standings and fighting with the country’s historic teams.
Carlos Antón is the sports director and one of the architects of the team’s success. Along with him, a coaching staff full of Spaniards, who are the basis of a project that aims very high. From Doha, where the squad is currently located, he talks to MARCA to review the latest news about the team and Asian football.
Q: First of all, congratulations on the great season. Did you expect this success?
A: It’s not over yet, the end result is what will dictate the outcome of the work. You always have the uncertainty of knowing what the jump will be like, especially because in our case there were many new things, many new players, but we were confident. The main objective was to be the best in the ‘other’ League, so to speak. There are four teams that have a history and an investment made in recent years that is difficult to overcome. Our goal was to be fighting to be at the top of that ‘other’ League. Today we are far beyond it, but, as I tell you, it is not definitive.
Q: Can Al-Qadsiah sneak into that fight between the big four in the medium or even short term?
A: I understand that from the outside now it seems like something very possible, but we are really a very young club. A very young project. The long-term idea is to compete and become a very important club in Asia. Not only for achieving results on the field, but also for the way of doing things off the field. But in the short term the philosophy is ‘game by game’. We have shown that we can compete with them, but the difficult thing is to maintain.
Carlos Antón, with Míchel, celebrating the promotion title to the Saudi Pro League.
Q: There is a large percentage of Spaniards within the coaching staff and sports management. How did the possibility of forming this project in this way arise?
A: There is a higher percentage with the change of coach (Míchel), but in other areas, for example, there are many nationalities. The work group closest to me, which is from the sports management, is not Spanish. There is Álvaro Ríos, technical secretary, who is, but there is Sam, head of football strategy, who is not. Then there is a Spaniard, who is the technical secretary, but there are two English, two Portuguese and an Indian. So it is a very international department. In the technical part there is a lot of Spanish, and also Spanish-speaking. Also in the training part there are more Spaniards, but in the other part we have French, Dutch, Venezuelans, Welsh… I have worked for many years in many different places and I think I know well what the strengths of the Spanish school are, but I have also really enjoyed the advantages of the Anglo-Saxon world and what I have tried is to try to focus on taking the best of these two worlds.
Spanish football is surviving thanks to natural talent, but there is no strategic plan
Q: What would you say is the key to the team’s success?
A: The first thing is a property and a board of directors that have supported us, that have given us autonomy and freedom. They have supported our proposals, being very demanding and having to justify everything, but they have given us the necessary resources to form a good project. The second thing is that a strategic plan has been developed, both in the squad, staff and club development. We have looked a lot at the personal part to generate a cohesive staff that is above individualities. As for the squad, we wanted competitive players, hungry, without egos. That, along with the leadership of Míchel and his coaching staff, is the key to success. In short, adequate resources and doing things with sense, not at all costs. We want to make a project that is sustainable in the long term, not fireworks now and then disappear.
Q: As a sports director, what have been the difficulties you have encountered within Saudi football?
A: I would say the other way around, what the advantages are, because I would be able to tell you more advantages than disadvantages. We are asked, we propose and I believe that it is not debauchery, but we are empowered, we are held responsible, a lot is demanded of us and what we are presenting is very well thought out. The evolution that the Saudi Pro League has had is because there has been a strategy. You can agree more or less with certain things, but there is a strategy. It is something that I miss in the Spanish Federation. Spanish football is surviving thanks to natural talent. There is no strategic plan about how other countries are growing or what our problems are, but as with natural talent we continue to win, because it continues to be covered up.
Carlos Antón with Iker Almansa, formerly of Girona.
Q: What would you like to see changed in Spanish football?
A: The first thing that has to change are the institutions that govern football. Without integrity and transparency, there is nothing and that can be controlled, because in other countries it is controlled. I also believe that we have been very successful thanks to chance, because culture and a very great influence from universities have had a lot of weight in the training of coaches, but for me the coaching courses in Spain can be improved.
Q: However, there are still many Spanish coaches abroad…
A: There are three factors. One, natural talent. Another, the environment, that in Spain there is a football environment that feeds itself and evolves on its own. And the other, training. I think the competitive system in Spain is very good for developing high-performance players and the influence of the university on football, directly or indirectly, has been very great, just like in Portugal. Above all at a methodological level, in how to structure the training and how to understand the learning processes. Then there is another part that is very important, which is the way of understanding the game, which is also something cultural and has been influenced by Barça, Villarreal… The Spanish coach sees football from an angle that is not seen in Portugal or England.
We saved a victory in the 95th minute and Nacho came out to celebrate as if he had won the Champions League final.
Q: Was that vision of the Spanish coaches one of the reasons why they signed Míchel?
A: I didn’t know Míchel. At first we weren’t even evaluating him and someone recommended that I have a talk with him. I was pleasantly surprised. We had a fairly in-depth selection process and in that process we ended up coming to the conclusion that it was what we needed for what we wanted to create and for the moment in which we found ourselves. I think it has been proven that it was the right decision.
Carlos Antón with Míchel.
Q: What was it that caught your attention about Míchel?
A: One of its best virtues is that it is very complete. There are coaches with a lot of leadership and little management, but he is very complete in every way. Everyone is delighted with him.
Q: Another of the proper names of this team is Nacho Fernández. How did the possibility of signing him arise?
A: We knew that his contract was ending and that he was looking for a team. We contacted him and presented the project to him. We started talking and tried to convince him. It came out not long ago that it is enchanted. He and his family, but we are even more so because he has adapted spectacularly. The other day we saved a victory in the 95th minute and he came out to celebrate as if he had won the Champions League final. To have someone who has won so much and, in such a different context, experience it the same way is incredible. This is what we were looking for, people who are motivated by their work, by their profession and with intrinsic values that do not change depending on the context. If we had dreamed it, we would have dreamed it just as it is happening.
Q: Could any other Spaniards arrive?
A: The truth is that in winter we are going to have little or no work. We have rebuilt the squad twice in 12 months. I landed on July 4, with the first day on August 12. We had no medical service, we had no performance department, there was no analyst, there was nothing. Three props and the players from before. More than a team we were a music band. Well, we brought in 17 new players and in winter another three. This summer, another 16 and we take out 20. So right now we will do little or nothing.
The Saudi Pro League is between the fifth and tenth best league in the world
Q: It is a team with a lot of young players. How do you attract that young talent?
A: We said we wanted this to be a step forward in their career and we didn’t ‘sell them the bike’. With exceptions such as Nacho or Auba, we sign players with very clear personality and human characteristics. People who are hungry, competitive, eager to take a step forward.
Q: Where is the Saudi Pro League?
A: I believe that Saudi football has nothing to envy of many leagues. It is among the best leagues in the world now. The point that is missing now is to balance the competition, so that there is not so much polarization. The moment the middle group raises the level a little, it will be one of the most attractive. For example, within our squad, it would not be a surprise if players jumped to Europe.
Q: Is it the new strategy of Saudi football that it is not just a one-way route, but that there can also be a return?
A: I think that is a reality now. First, that initial attraction has to be generated, which is obviously by bringing in stars. By the time that was generated, other types of things had already been done.
Carlos Antón with Nacho.
Q: So what step is the Saudi Pro League in? Near the top five leagues?
A: I think it is in the top ten. Between the top five and the top ten. Where? I don’t know, but each team has eight high-level internationals and I am no longer talking about the four big teams, but also others like Al-Shabab with Carrasco or Al-Ettifaq with Wijnaldum. As soon as that middle block improves, I think the league will take a leap. There are European football performance indicators in many aspects.
Q: Could Al-Qadsiah compete in Spain?
A: Without a doubt.
Q: Fighting in the middle table even?
A: I believe that the team could compete and that it would not suffer in the Spanish League. I believe and I want to think.
Q: Chinese football, for example, completely collapsed after the initial boom. What differences are there with this explosion of Saudi football?
A: I understand that the natural tendency is to compare with that, maybe even with Qatar, but here there is a national strategic plan at all levels. We have begun to see this after they built the foundation. In China they invested in players, but they did not invest in infrastructure, there was no clear plan, it was simply money and that’s it. Not here, here there is training, infrastructure, strategy. Then there is a big difference for me, which is that China does not have a soccer population. Or in Qatar, they didn’t have the population. There is a larger population here compared to Qatar and people like football, they are football fans.
Q: Maybe the only thing missing is to enter European competitions or for Asian competitions to raise the level.
A: It would be very positive and it would be much easier to attract players. The same thing happens in Japan, which, as a team, has reached such a high ceiling within Asia that they have no competition.
