Having been cruelly booted out of San Mamés over the summer with his boss losing the presidential election, JoaquÃÂn Caparrós was perhaps on the look-out for a bit of adventure.
The former Athletic Bilbao boss certainly found that with Swiss side Neuchatel Xamax and their âÂÂmaverickâ Chechen owner Bulat Chagaev, having become the fourth manager to be fired from the club since the very potty president took over in May.
JokinâÂÂs five match spell was ended on Friday, apparently for having dinner with his players. This heinous crime took place after Chagaev allegedly entered the dressing room with pistol-packing bodyguards to give the players a piece of his rather frightening mind after a 2-2 draw with Lausanne Sports.
âÂÂOne day they are going to kill all of us. If you miss a pass or make a mistake you are afraid something will happen,â revealed a player who unsurprisingly wished to remain unnamed.
Caparrós was on his way to catch the Spanish national teamâÂÂs fiery 3-2 win over Chile in St. Gallen before being told that his Neuchatel number was up.
âÂÂWhat happened with Caparrós was easy to understand,â explained Chagaev to a pant-peeing AS journalist in an interview published in MondayâÂÂs edition. âÂÂWe lost the feeling, the perfume ran out.âÂÂ
Chagaev also denied that his players received an extra terrifying incentive to play well during the next game, claiming that what happened in the dressing room did not involve guns, explaining that âÂÂyou have to demand that they do their job well as they are professionals and I have great aspirations for Neuchatel Xamax."
Chagaev has not been slow in finding a successor for Caparrós, with VÃÂctor Muñoz looking for a fresh Chechen experience having pulled out of a deal Russian outfit Terek Grozny to allow Ruud Gullit to take over the side.
He and his Spanish playing crew of VÃÂctor Sánchez, David Navarro and Javier Arizmendi will now be looking to make it through the next round of matches unscathed in a footballing and very physical sense.
The match that Caparrós missed out on, SpainâÂÂs victory over Chile, broke the recent tradition of la Selección not really giving two hoots about friendlies, and also helped the ease the straining relations between the Barcelona and Real Madrid players in the squad. The warring factions united to go toe-to-toe with the Chile players in a brawl in the final seconds of the encounter.
âÂÂWhen we are all here we are all teammates and we defend La Selecciónâ declared Cesc Fabregas, who scored two goals in the Swiss affair to continue a rather excellent spell since leaving Arsenal for the Camp Nou.
âÂÂWeâÂÂre all fighting for the same cause and weâÂÂre all team mates, thereâÂÂs no doubt whatsoever about that,â explained the other goalscorer Andrés Iniesta - words that will no doubt mean that José Mourinho will need to begin his mind-wiping, anti-Barça reprogramming process from scratch when his footballers return from TuesdayâÂÂs game against Liechtenstein.
