Maccabi have held their first press conference of the new season, presenting their past and future head coach Oscar Garcia
As a start sign of the year to come Maccabi Tel Aviv held their first press conference of the 2014/15 season. In attendance were owner-representative Jack Angelides, sports director Jordi Cruyff and head coach Oscar Garcia, who returned to Maccabi's ranks after a year at English Championship side Brighton & Hove Albion. Angelides open the press conference by saying: "We're holding this press conference on the eve of the season's opening practice. We're all delighted to welcome back Oscar Garcia as Maccabi's head coach. We all know what was achieved when Oscar first joined us and we're looking forward again to a season with a lot of hard work and a lot of focus so that we can again reach the heights that we want to".
Garcia received a warm welcome, welcomed those in attendance with a "good morning" in Hebrew and began his words with congratulations to Maccabi Tel Aviv's basketball and handball clubs on winning their national championships: "I am delighted to come back here. I want to realise my dream to play in Europe with Maccabi and I am looking forward to getting started as soon as possible. I left as you know for personal reasons, family reasons, and now most of these problems have been solved. Maccabi contacted me after the last manager left and I am really happy to have been chosen by Jack, Jordi and Mitch. I am a better coach, I've improved a lot in one year and I want the same mentality for all the players, to try to be better every day, to try to improve every day. I am very happy to be here".
As for the forthcoming season, Garcia said: "I like this challenge. I am brave. I know Maccabi won the last two championships and it's a fantastic challenge for me, a fantastic challenge for the club, for the players, for everybody. We know it will be a difficult season but I am confident we can have a fantastic season. We need hungry players, the players need to be hungry for success. One of the most difficult things in football is to keep winning and we will work on this a lot. Mentally, psychologically we need to be strong. It's not easy to keep winning a lot of years in a row but we will try our best. I'm sure this season we will have more competition for places and it will be good for the team, for the players, for the staff, for the club. Now we have a fantastic group of players. We will try to bring some more players. It's very important to have competition for places in the squad. I want to have the best players as is possible ".
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2o0czD8GARU
As for his preparations for the upcoming season's matches, Garcia commented: "We try to choose the best eleven for each game but you have to think that normally the coach knows everything, knows which players might be injured or which players are tired. As I said before, if we have a bigger squad we will have a lot of options. It's the best thing for a coach, to have a lot of options to choose the best eleven. My mentality, my philosophy is to play for the fans. I like when the fans are happy. Normally they are happy when their team win but I also like to play attractive football. I love it when the fans come and say maybe we didn't win but we played really well, we enjoyed the game. But of course everybody wants to win. I am a Maccabi fan and the fans know that now a Maccabi fan is coaching the team. We will try to do our best. My mentality, my philosophy is that the players should feel that the fans are proud of them".
Asked about his selection of Garcia as Maccabi's new head coach, sports director Jordi Cruyff said: "Oscar Garcia is our best option, our head coach left and Oscar left Brighton so it was a simple equation. It's a matter of stability for the players and for the club so it was an easy and clear decision for us to take. Jack and I knew this would be our first choice and we're delighted it worked out". When asked if he thought the competition from other clubs in the Israeli Premier League would be tougher this season, Jordi responded: "Yes, we absolutely expect that, but first we have to look at ourselves and to maintain this hunger. When you've had a few winning years, and last year we had a nice European campaign, the first thing is to have the players have the passion inside and the focus and the hunger to keep succeeding. So of course the other teams will improve and it's up to us, together with the owner, and Jack and Oscar and myself, to reinforce the team, to make it stronger in a way that is visible. We always try to keep one step ahead. I think in the beginning of June it's normally very early in the market so sometimes good things take a little bit longer. But that's general and it's nothing to do with any specific players, it's just a general rule of the market. Of course we want to make the team stronger and we'll be ready when we have to".
Maccabi owner-representative Jack Angelides had this to say about the departure of last season's head coach Paulo Sousa: "I wasn't surprised Paulo wanted to leave because it was a possibility that presented itself a number of weeks before the end of the league season. In football you have to be keen to every option and if someone can improve their position by leaving we understand that decision. We knew this would be one of his options and things like that happen. We're just happy that Oscar Garcia is back with us".
