Valdes: "I'm not only looking at the money"

Barcelona player Víctor Valdés gave an interview to Catalan sports paper Sport.





Joan Laporta announced that the club wants to renew your contract. What is your wish?
My wish has always been to stay as long as I possible can with Barça. I grew up here and like every other youth player I want to retire here. But of course, that doesn't only depend on me...

You mean that the board should make a move?
The only thing I can do is to keep working like I have been doing until this moment, day by day, putting all my energy and keeping the motivation. I cannot do more than that.

What do you think when you read the club is looking for another goalkeeper?
It's normal that a club like this one is always looking to sign the best players in the world.

There have been rumours that you're asking a lot of money, as much as Casillas. Are these rumours true?
No. I'm not the one who's going to compare myself with other players. And I'm not one of those who are only looking at the money either. I just want to be at this club as many years as possible. The financial issue isn't that important, I mean that. I can assure you that I, nor anyone from my entourage, has talked about these matters.

Staying must be important for you...
Every time that I put on the shirt, that's special, an honour. And it's not just now. I have this feeling with the first team and I had it when I started playing here. I also want to achieve things for this club. My goal is to help Barcelona to win trophies. Of everyting I have done untill now, I only remember the moments in which we have won trophies.

The routine isn't tiring?
Not at all. I feel really privileged to live this life.

You could leave because of being curious about discovering other cultures. Playing in Italy, England... or Jamaica. Or you feel good here?
I have my life in place here. I'm not the kind of person who has a lot of people around him. If I want to learn more about other cultures, I go and travel there and that's it. If I want to play football, I stay in Barcelona.

You enjoy life more than ever in seasons like this one?
In this club I've seen a lot so we cannot be over-confident. We started well but we have to keep this going until the end so the euphoria and the results can lead to trophies.

Don't tell me we're not going to win the three trophies...
From the outside, people talk like that. But the players know how difficult it is to win every game and we're very careful. Of course we want to win every trophy. If we play three competitions, we want to win all three. If we play five of them, we want to win all five. We're on our way to win something because we're dealing very good with the situation. But seasons are evaluated at the end.

It seems like you want to lower the enthusiasm but I'm afraid that's not possible. What this team is doing is impressive.
It's normal that after two years without winning anything, people want to see good football and win games. But winning is all that counts. It's normal there's some euphoria but those who are here for a while know that you should stay very calm.


This was the first part of this interview. You will be able to read the following parts in the coming days with Valdés talking -among other things- about his friendship with Iniesta and about his hobbies.

Read more:
Barcelona working on Valdes renewal
Hleb: "I know that scoring is my problem"
Valdes is next on renewal list