According to the Marca newspaper, the former president of Barcelona, Gaspat, recently gave an interview to Zero Point Radio, talking about some of his important transfers during the Barcelona presidency and his relationship with Real Madrid president Florentino.
— Figo's departure and the urgent signing of Overmars and Petit
It was August, Figo was gone, and I asked the coaching staff which other player had similar conditions. They told me it was hard to find, but there was a player in England like him (Overmars) who wasn't up to Figo's level yet, but was close. So I threw myself into it like a madman. This is the first error.
The second mistake: I don't doubt that the coaching staff makes sense, but at the time everyone knew that Barca had money, and the worst thing you could do was when you were going to buy people and everyone else knew you had money in your pocket. It's not that I was in a hurry, I followed the coaching staff ,I signed Overmars and then he got injured. Although he is a very good player, he has not been successful at Barca. His team (Arsenal) recommended another player to me, petit, and that time, I was well aware that the coaching staff understood that it was a good thing.
--Florentino
Florentino was my friend and I admired him, and he was an extraordinary person at that time. Then he became the president of Real Madrid, and I would hate him with all my heart for this Florentino. On Figo's case, I will never forgive him for what he did to me. As a man, as a businessman, he is perfect, but as the president of Real Madrid, he is still far behind.
- (Real Madrid) could sign Mbappe
Unfortunately, that's right. If I had stepped in, I might have been making trouble, I might have been based in Paris.
— Karumbu and Real Madrid
When they [Real Madrid] wanted to sign him, I stopped. Two years passed between when they considered signing him and when they finally signed him. One day I went to the house of Mantovani (then chairman of Sampdoria) and there was a Real Madrid superintendent there at the time, but he hid behind a cypress tree when I came, so I didn't see him. Mantovani said to me 'but Juan, if there's a Real Madrid director here', I say 'where is he', 'he sees you coming and hides'. But in the two years [of Kalamb] didn't go to Real Madrid, at least I stopped because he was a very good player.
- When signing for Ronaldo, [Gaspat] pretended to be a (hotel) waiter
Ronaldo's club will certainly regret the transfer. There's a very normal contract clause, which is that if you don't sign a contract to a player, it's not valid for the club he's originally playing for, which is obvious. The players were in Brazil, training for the national team, we had to sign with the club and the two sides had an agreement, but we couldn't get the player's signature.
And according to the terms, if the signature of the player is not obtained before a certain date, then the contract is immediately declared invalid. I believe the club has done everything possible to try to get me permission from the Brazilian manager to meet Ronaldo, but under the circumstances, I couldn't see him and I couldn't get close to his training base.
At that time, there were two tall and tall security guards in the elevator room. I didn't even try, I tried several times, but I couldn't even get in the elevator door. But if the waiter came and said he was going to go to [the players's] room, the two security guards thought there was no problem, it was nothing more than a player who wanted a Coke, so they let me in. I took a coke straight to Ronaldo's room. Ronaldo signed a contract with Barca in his hotel bed.
— Ronaldo's reaction to the matter
He didn't know me at the time. He called his agent and said "There's a gentleman here..." "He's going to do this." He pushed me out and asked me to talk to his agent and I said, "Please, I need to do this." He said, "Juan, calm down, let me have a word with Ronaldo and I'll tell him it's you coming." Ronaldo, you can calm down and sign. ”
After he (Ronaldo) signed, I hid the contract in my coat so the security guards couldn't see it. Then I met the Brazilian manager and I said to him, "I'll give you two choices: one, tomorrow I'll have a press conference announcing that Ronaldo is our new player and showing off his contract; and two, you, me, and Ronaldo will have a press conference with you to announce the news so that we can all be decent." "In the end we chose the second option, but the Brazilian national team was reluctant.
- Maradona
We had to leave the hotel under police escort and boca youth fans almost killed us. I developed a deep friendship with Diego (Maradona) and I was sad when he was going to Napoli.
(Meat-eating rabbit)