When I was little, at school I was asked to write a letter to my 30-year-old self. Since for me at that time a twenty-year-old boy was already an old man, I wrote the letter to a man, that is, me, practically retired and with life resolved. More than writing a letter, I sent an accounting. I allowed myself to dream. I told my 30-year-old self that I hoped he had climbed the 14 eight-thousanders, traveled the world and marked a time at Barça with the captain’s armband on one arm. I calculated that by the time I was thirty he would have given me time to win seven or eight Champions League titles. All of this, both the mountains and the Blaugrana glory, non-negotiably alongside my older brother, Dani, who remains as much a friend as he is a brother, which is saying something.

I remembered that childish writing this week when I heard Xavi say, to justify his goodbye at the end of the season, that being Barça coach is cruel, unpleasant and a terrible drain.

I have always liked the man from Terrassa because I have the habit of having sympathy for the legends of my club and Xavi is an indisputable one. Also because coming to the culé bench when he was burning like Nyiragongo and getting a League out of his hat deserves recognition. The same thing happens to me with geniuses like Cruyff, Guardiola or Messi, that I find myself grateful to those who have made me happy.

But I especially find Xavi’s lack of perspective difficult. It already happened when a few years ago he praised the benefits of Qatar without noticing that living in a dictatorship as a soccer star is not the same as being a Nepali worker. He lives well and people are very respectful, as he said, as long as you don’t hang from a scaffolding to get paid a pittance.

I understand that these are difficult times. That, as Pep also admitted from Manchester, the Barça bench causes incomparable pressure on anyone’s back. But yesterday while he was watching Barça suffer against Alavés until Vitor Roque scored another goal and then he was sent off in a shameful way, I missed some words from Xavi Hernández for Xavi when he was a child. Because being a Barça coach is surely difficult and sometimes you have to have everyone give their opinion on your work when your lines come out crooked.

But for the next chosen one, being Barça coach should rhyme with other words: excitement, challenge, happiness, ambition, desire or confidence.

Perhaps as the months go by, the culé bench seems less cruel to Xavi. Because time gives perspective. Even one day the 6 may feel a happy nostalgia for his days as Barça coach and think that it was even a privilege and luck to experience that. And also with his brother.