Nice feature in the Telegraph:
Carlos Carvalhal exclusive interview: How Descartes, spin classes and self-confidence are fuelling Swansea's 'Mini Cooper'
"You know Descartes — the way that Descartes thinks?" asks Carlos Carvalhal.
This is not the sort of question you expect to be asked by a football manager. Fortunately, Carvalhal manages to live without my views on the 17th-century French philosopher, and swiftly offers his own, reflecting on “complex phenomena” and concluding that it would be a mistake to disregard the “connections” between them. This, in short, is how he sees a football team working, including his own at Swansea City.
“I think realising the simple thing about these connections makes the Portuguese different,” Carvalhal adds, barely pausing for breath. “I am not saying we are the best people of the world … but we are really very special people! We are special because we connect people, we understand very well the connections. And we understand football is about connections.
“It is not divided. It is not numbers. The connections are very important with the fans, with the journalists, with the people. The Portuguese like to do this — it’s a characteristic. If you remember any Portuguese that you know then maybe one time you will think, ‘I talked to Carlos and this guy, in his communication, in the way he talks, is also like that’.”
Carvalhal is indeed a proud member of his country’s coaching community. He took his pro-licence with Jose Mourinho and studied at university with the Manchester United manager’s assistant, Rui Faria. He shares Mourinho’s intensity, and desire to go “deep” into his job, an attitude that has already provoked an impressive response at Swansea since he arrived between Christmas and new year, just days after he left Championship Sheffield Wednesday.
“Listen, my father sold paint,” Carvalhal explains, in his first interview since arriving in south Wales. “My mother worked at home, making clothes, trying to make some money. I had a plan. I played football professionally but I also studied at university.
“I had a one-month holiday from football, but I had an anatomy exam to do, and it was the most difficult exam. I said to my girlfriend: ‘I am going to disappear for two weeks’. I had to study. No contact. I was in my apartment, I disappeared from everybody, I had a beard like Robinson Crusoe and at the end I did it.
“I could have gone to the Bahamas on holiday that month but I wanted to study anatomy. And when I want something then I go deep into it. So when I do this [Swansea], then I have that self-confidence.”
Carvalhal, full of smiles, energy, determination, did not have time to “go deep” into Swansea. The club were — still are — bottom of the Premier League and in danger of being cut adrift. They have claimed seven points out of 12 since the 52-year-old arrived, and the two victories — against Watford and, last Monday, Liverpool — are the “big vitamins” ahead of Wednesday’s crucial home fixture against Arsenal.
Carvalhal talks a lot about the “culture” of a club. “You can create a model like an architect drawing a picture of a house,” he explains. “So we draw a picture of what we want as a team and will follow that — understanding that sometimes you might have to do a new wall or the kitchen is not like that and you have to change it. But the idea is to follow the plan.”
Arriving mid-season is different. “It’s an emergency plan,” Carvalhal explains. “Sometimes when you work, you are like the special rangers. The ones they call in for the difficult job. You must look at what you have in your hands, the good things they did in the past and try to attack the things that are crucial. There were a lot of mistakes, for example, between defence and attack and the team lost a lot of balls, a lot of goals, so we had to attack that problem.”
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