Manchester City manager Pep Guardiola has confessed that a break from football would "do me good". He expressed his desire to dedicate time to learning French, honing his culinary skills and playing golf once he steps away from management.
Despite his love for the adrenaline rush of his Premier League job, Guardiola made a surprising admission during an interview with a renowned Spanish chef following his decision to sign a new two-year contract and after City team suffered four consecutive losses. He said: "I want to leave it and go and play golf but I can't. A time will come when I feel it's enough and I'll definitely stop then.
"I'm not going to manage another team. I'm not talking about the long-term future but what I'm not going to do is leave Manchester City and go to another country to do the same thing as I am now.
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"I wouldn't have the energy to do so. I'm still here doing what I am today. But the thought of starting off somewhere else, with all the process of the training and so on... no, no, no! Maybe a national team but that's different.
"I should stop, like these chefs that go to other countries, stop and see what we've done well and what we could do better and when you're busy all day day after day you don't have time to do that. I think stopping would do me good."
Guardiola confessed to Marbella-born chef Dani Garcia on his Desmontadito YouTube channel that his cooking skills are limited to fried eggs and chips. However, he's got plans for self-improvement: "I'm still young and when I stop, there's several things I want to do. One of them is to learn French, dedicate my free time to myself so I can play golf and then begin to learn how to cook simple things."
Pep Guardiola has outlined his plans after leaving Man City (Image: CameraSport via Getty Images)
Speaking from Tast, the Catalan-inspired eatery he supports in Manchester, Guardiola opened up about the solitude a football manager faces, especially after a tough run: "The starting point with coping with the problems of defeat would be being with people, your family basically. But no-one can really console the loneliness of the football manager.
"You have people beside you but the bad decisions, why have I done that, it's gone wrong because I did this, I didn't push them enough....the pain of the defeat, you feel it alone. You might have friends around you, but when you close that bedroom door and turn off the light there's no consolation. You have to let one or two days pass and then start again.
"Golf helps me. One of the best therapies I have is when the Augusta Masters or one of the major tournaments comes round from Thursday to Sunday and I prepare my matches at home or here in Tast.
"I look at our rival and the images I want to take but always with the golf on in the background. A bottle of wine, a glass of wine, work and hearing: 'Now so and so, Tiger Woods for instance, is going to tee off, look at the shot, and then get back to what I was doing, and then the same again. Working like that I think makes me a better manager."