Inspirational defender, captain and central figure at Barcelona, Carles Puyol, has announced on Tuesday that he will be leaving the Catalan club at the end of the season.
At a brief press conference at 4pm CET, held at the Joan Gamper training complex and ahead of the evening training session, Puyol simply began by announcing: “I want to announce that I won’t be a Barcelona player at the end of the season.”
As well as being packed with journalists, Puyol was also supportively joined by sporting director Andoni Zubizarreta, great friend Ivan de la Peña, agent Ramon Sostres, physio Juanjo Brau, club doctor Ricard Pruna, as well as team-mates Pinto, Bartra, Tello, Montoya, Affelay, Adriano and Oier.
Puyol, who will celebrate his 36th birthday next month, continued by making it clear that he’ll be giving everything he’s got to help the team, for the remainder of the season.
“There’s still three months of the season to go and I won’t be relaxing. I will be helping the team.”
Ahead of the press call, it had already been made clear that Puyol wouldn’t be taking any questions, following his announcement. Given there would be strong interest in what the future would hold beyond the summer, he explained: “I don’t know yet what I’ll be doing when the season ends, but certainly in the summer, I’ll be having a rest.”
That last comment, a clear indication that he doesn’t expect to be part of the Spain squad in Brazil, that will be defending their World Cup title, of which he was such a central figure during the 2010 tournament.
Puyol concluded by announcing that at the end of the season, he will hold another press conference, to say his farewells. No doubt the club and the fans will also now begin planning ways to say goodbye to their captain, in style.
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