20 months ago he stopped his volleyball career as he wanted to work with children in Spain. However he ended up coaching one of the best teams in Europe -PGE Skra Bełchatów. Through the first year of his coaching they won the Polish League where he managed to gain the respect as a young coach. When it comes to his ambitions as a coach, he mentions Marcelo Mendez and Andrea Anastasi as his leading role models.
– Anna Wiecek: When exactly did you feel it was the right moment to end your carrer?
– Miguel Falasca: The decision wasn’t immediate. Little by little I came to the point where it was the right thing to do. My last season in Skra when we lost the possibility to win the Champions League and also the final of Plus Liga, the club made it clear that they wanted to change the team. That was the first time I thought about ending my career. But I have received the offer from Russia with a good financial opportunity for me. Now when I think about it I know that I made good decision to accept the offer.
– So what have changed?
– Midway through the season in Russia I was feeling exhausted and my family didn’t like all the travelling. I informed my manager that it will be my last season even though he already had other offers for me from Russia and Turkey. I just knew it was the right moment.
– Wasn’t it Spiridonov (Russian player) who upset you so much that you didn’t want to play no more?
– No! (laughs) we had a great relationship together. He might be acting in a certain way with the public when he plays and maybe too provocative but outside the arena he is a good person and we are good friends. Spiridonow reminds me of a Spanish guy I used to play with in the national team, named Israel Rodriguez. He is now a different person having gained experience and has calmed down. I believe this is exactly what is going to happen with Spiridonow. These kind of personalities fight more with themselves rather than others, we all react differently when it comes to pressure or stress. I believe that is his way now but I it will change with the experience.
– You didn’t want to end your career in Skra like Stephane Antiga?
– I wasn’t thinking in these terms and I wasn’t sure about my position in the team. After my last season there I didn’t know what would be the new conception of the team. It wasn’t clear how the coach Jacek Nawrocki wanted to continue his work. I was happy in Skra as a player and so was my family.
– Is that true that your relationship with Nawrocki wasn’t great during your last season in Skra?
– I am always very clear in the way I work and the way I am with other team mates and the coach. I am a very straight forward person and never keep things inside me. Being such an experienced setter, I know a lot about volleyball after many years of playing and I have built my own way of working and how I want to play. I believe when you work for so many years it should be more of a conversation between you and the coach, rather than being instructed. Our private relationship was always very good but maybe he thought that team needed another type of setter with different way of playing than me.
– So only after a year break you were back in Poland as a coach, why?
– After coming back from Russia I wanted to go back to Malaga and start working with children. That’s when the offer from Bełchatów arrived. Trust me this was a big surprise for me, I agreed immediately.
– In your first year with Skra you brought them back to the top of Polish league. That’s not a bad start!
– That’s not a bad start at all. That’s why Antiga won World Championships with Poland, he was jealous that I won a gold medal as a coach (laughs). My way of working as a coach is very simple, I just want to win all the time. It doesn’t matter who the opposing team is, we play to win not to play good. I don’t consider the level of competition I play with my team. Victory is all I’m interested in.
– It isn`t hard to win with the team you have!
– We have built the team. Not a group with great setter, great opposite and amazing receivers. We have built the team where the setter plays the way the opposite likes, with the receivers who work good with the setter. The machine has to all work perfectly all together to achieve great results. I always want to see my team playing the way that even if we lose it is because the opponents were playing amazing, not because we haven’t done everything we could. We always need to play as close to perfection as possible. This is what I believe as a coach.
– Do you still want to help them play?
– Not at all. Now by being a coach I don’t miss playing volleyball. I love my new job. Comparing to when I used to play in Skra I feel more of a leader now. When I was a setter in Skra I occasionally wasn’t in control of the game and had to do what I was told. Now I feel similar to the way I played in the Spanish national team. I had more freedom to decide on the way I wanted to play and also I used to push my teammates to work harder and to play better. I need this kind of leadership in my way of work. I always liked to be a little bit of second coach and with Andrea Anastasi I had that freedom which was very difficult for me to find at the beginning in Skra. It took a while to find a way of working that I wanted and to be important for the team at the same time without any problems that I was too pushy into decisions not related to my position.
– Apparently your brother didn’t have an easy time with you in national team.
– Trust me he didn’t (laughs). We fought a lot but for me it was always a way of motivating him to work harder and so he becomes a better player. Now he wants to become a physical trainer so maybe we will work together in the future.
– In the Polish national team?
– At the moment they have a great coach and he is a big friend of mine. I know how difficult it is to be a coach in the Polish team, because one little mistake and you are gone. That’s what happened to Daniel Castellani and Andrea Anastasi, they had great results with the team but a few bad results and the federation immediately wanted to change things. The thing is that no one can argue with the decision because after every change of a Polish coach, the team started to win again. But within two years every coach started having problems and they changed him again. It’s a little bit like going round in circles. I am not thinking of the national team. I have signed a three year contract with Skra and I want to complete this project.
– And which coach do you admire the most?
– I have always been very lucky with the coaches that I have worked with. I started in Italy with a great person and coach Maurizio Menarini. He helped me a lot to start my volleyball career. I have big feelings for Raul Lozano whom I worked with in the Spanish national team when I was 20 years old. I learnt a lot from Marcelo Mendez in Palma de Mallorca and I improved the most when I turned 30 years old. He is the person that has had the biggest influence on me as a player and whom I want to follow in my work as a coach. I was lucky because straight after Marcelo I started working with Andrea Anastasi who in a certain way continued they way I wanted to improve as a setter.
– Was it easy to work with Anastasi?
– We have always had an amazing connection not only related to our view of volleyball but also the way he controlled the team. He was always able to push the players to work better. What I have always admired about Andrea is that he could easily give instructions and opinions to the players without losing his leadership of the team. He was sometimes too honest but the way he worked with us he never lost the huge respect everyone had for him. He has always been very confident about himself but at the same time he knew how to listen what others wanted to say.
– People accuse him of being a coach who doesn’t like to change his mind either about the tactics nor the players.
– I completely disagree with this opinion. Many times he changed something during the game after one of us gave him advice on doing certain things in a different way than we planned. He knows his wisdom but he also listens to others. What’s more important changing his minds doesn’t make him lose his leadership. I respect him for the fact that he doesn’t stick to his opinion if he knows that someone else might have a better idea. In Poland sometimes people think they know better that a coach with 30 years experience. They criticise a certain decision without any idea what’s happening behind the closed doors. Sometimes I think that me and him are very similar.
– You have definitely found a better way of working with Mariusz Wlazly than Anastasi?
– To know what’s happening inside the team, you must be inside the team. It’s a simple philosophy I follow. If you don’t see things with your eyes you can never say they are true. My relationship with Mariusz is better when I’m his coach. When I played in Skra as a setter I loved to play fast and this wasn’t Mariusz’s Style. Only after time we both adjusted our way of work. Now he’s probably the fastest in the world. Me working with him as a coach was easier because first of all he wanted to play in Skra and from day one we had the same goals.
– Are you saying his and Anastasi goals were different?
– When Andrea started his work with the Polish team Mariusz didn’t want to play in the national team. It wasn’t because of Andrea but because he had another idea about his life for that moment. Andrea was unlucky with Mariusz decision but he couldn’t do anything. I don’t know if it’s true that when he wanted to come back Andrea said no. I haven’t spoken to any of them about it because it has nothing to do with me. But I can understand Andrea’s decision if this was the case. He built the team without Mariusz winning bronze in the European Championships, gold medial in the World League and silver in the World Cup. Those guys worked hard and maybe they didn’t want someone who didn’t work for the past two years to join the team just for the Olympic Games. It’s not as easy as people think. It has nothing to do with revenge. It’s more of a case that the hard work and preparations for the past two to three years and the conception of the team were already there.
– You think Antiga was in a better situation before the World Championships?
– Definitely. He was completely new, he needed to build the team the way he wanted. Andrea was already working with them for two years and had his own vision. Stephane had to start again. He spoke with Mariusz and he included him in the team. It’s a completely different situation. No one remembers now that when I returned to Skra as a coach everyone was saying to me that I made wrong decision letting Atanasijevic go because Mariusz is finished and he will never play well again. Only a year ago everybody was criticising him, now they criticise Andrea that he didn’t put him in the team. Where is the logic?
– He admitted recently he made a mistake.
– A mistake is when you do something wrong, and in my opinion Andrea hasn’t done anything wrong by building his team without Mariusz after he clearly said he didn’t want to play in national team.
– Last weekend you won against Lotos 3:2 but you described the victory as a lose, why?
– The more you win the more you want to win. Playing against Andrea in that game it was a little bit like beating my brother on play station. Double motivation. Besides we didn’t play great. I wanted to show I can beat my master and we did but not in the style I expected. That’s why I said it’s better if we treat that game as a lose and learn from all our mistakes.
Photo: Agencja Gazeta
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