Miguel Perez Cuesta

Nice article:

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http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/football/article-2202291/The-making-mighty-Michu-He-grew-Cazorla-scored-fun-La-Liga-hes-flying-Swan.html


‘I watched them on TV last season,’ he says. ‘When the offer came I was very happy. In Spain every person knows Michael Laudrup.’

 

Nice interview. "Money is not too important to me. Winning is important. Goals are important." Won't do himself any harm with the Swans fans with that one.

 

This guy has to be the buy of the season. I know its only 3 games. But, am loving what i am watching. There will be some envious eyes out there.

 

"Unlike Sigurdsson, his team-mates don’t complain privately about his work-rate." - interesting comment

Michu sounds like a top lad. Certainly not a prima-donna

 

He grew up with Cazorla, scored for fun in La Liga and now he's a flying Swan

Michu apologises a lot. He says sorry for eating during this interview, he says it again when his phone buzzes. Most often, he says sorry for his expanding but incomplete vocabulary. Speaking English is a big deal to him.

‘I am not happy when I do not do it right,’ he says. ‘I want to say what I think and that is hard. I must get better.’ He then mutters in Spanish before throwing his hands in the air when the right word comes to mind. ‘Practice,’ he says. ‘In two months I will be very good, I promise. A teacher comes to my flat three nights a week for two or three hours so I can learn. I will soon speak well.’

It’s Michu, not Swansea City, who pays for the lessons and when it comes to Facebook and Twitter he does the English translations. Angel Rangel, the elder statesman among the club’s Spaniards, helped with this when Michu first joined from Rayo Vallecano in July, but now the midfielder wants to do it himself. ‘I want to learn and this is the best way,’ he adds. ‘I like to read English newspapers, watch the television, talk to people. I can then learn more from my team-mates. I will be better when I talk English properly — I believe that.’

This interview took place on Tuesday; Aston Villa host Swansea on Saturday. He will be at least two hours of lessons further into his learning by kick-off and that doesn’t bode well for Villa boss Paul Lambert. The less articulate version of Michu, 26, has already made something of a mark on the Barclays Premier League.

Midfield maestro
Full name: Miguel Perez Cuesta
Age: 26
Height: 6ft 1in
Club: Swansea
Fee: £2million

He scored 15 goals for Rayo Vallecano last season — his first in La Liga. His celebration of holding his hand to his ear stems from silencing the Granada crowd when he scored in Rayo Vallecano’s 1-0 victory last season. They had abused him after a missed penalty the season before.
.Two goals, one delightful in its execution, came on his debut at QPR. Then there were strikes against West Ham and Sunderland, making it four in his first three games. Like Gylfi Sigurdsson, his predecessor in Swansea’s midfield, he rarely scores a bad one. Unlike Sigurdsson, his team-mates don’t complain privately about his work-rate.
He is perfect for Swansea but also not what you might expect. From an advanced position behind the striker, he passes well, beats players, can poach and shoot from distance with either foot. Above all, he’s a thinking footballer — and man — who is comfortable taking possession in small spaces.

But he’s also 6ft 1in, dwarfing Leon Britton, Wayne Routledge and Nathan Dyer in Swansea’s midfield. He wins headers; he is the target for long balls and crosses. When Michael Laudrup spoke of adding a Plan B and a greater goal threat he was thinking of Michu as key to both. And to think he cost just £2million.

‘The Spanish market, because of the economy at home, is good for foreign teams now,’ Michu says. ‘Santi cost Arsenal £15m, £16m. That is not much for him.’ He is talking, of course, about Arsenal midfielder Cazorla. The pair grew up at Real Oviedo, in Michu’s home city in northern Spain.

‘I remember one funny game,’ Michu says. ‘Santi was on the left, going on the outside and beating two, three players. So good. Then they started saying to themselves, “Push him in on to his right foot”. They did and he beat three players. He is right-footed but they could not tell because he was so good with his left. I think he is the best player at Arsenal — £15m for him is a very, very good deal. You’ll see.’

Michu, otherwise known as Miguel Perez Cuesta, is from a sporty, middle-class family. His father, a manager at an electricity supplier, claims to his sons that he was good enough to be a professional. Brother Hernan, 31, played for Real Oviedo and their mother is a teacher who ‘also likes football’.

Michu started young, signing for Oviedo at ‘five or six’ and stayed until 21, but missed the club’s better days, playing more than 100 games in the third and fourth tiers. ‘We were a big team,’ he says. ‘I remember Stan Collymore coming for a very short time when we were in La Liga. But then we had money problems.’

In 2003, shortly before Michu scored on debut, the club were relegated to the third tier and immediately forced down another level because they had not paid their players. Michu hedged his bets by studying business administration and management at the University of Oviedo — ‘I did the first year of a four-year course and it went well. I will definitely return and finish it at some point’ — but decided to focus on football.

He stepped up in 2007 to the second tier to join Celta Vigo, another former La Liga team suffering after over-spending, but progress was slow. ‘I was there four years and I think we had eight trainers,’ he says. ‘None really believed in me. I’d play one game and be on the side for three. A footballer needs to feel his trainer believes in him.’

That figure came in Jose Ramon Sandoval, the coach of Rayo Vallecano. He had won promotion to La Liga playing passing football and wanted Michu to be a creative force in his midfield in 2011-12, but the club were pitifully poor.

Against a backdrop of strike threats from players (Michu says he was always paid on time despite reports he occasionally went unpaid at each of his Spanish clubs), Michu flourished. ‘Money is not too important to me,’ he says. ‘Winning is important. Goals are important.’

He scored 15 — the most of any midfielder in La Liga — and some pundits now tip him for a place in the national squad. In a cheap frame in his tiny office, Sandoval kept a picture of Michu, the star of a swashbuckling little team that somehow stayed up. The parallels with Swansea were obvious.

‘I watched them on TV last season,’ he says. ‘When the offer came I was very happy. In Spain every person knows Michael Laudrup.’

Vallecano needed money and Swansea made the best offer, despite Michu’s agent approaching ‘nearly every club in the Premier League’, according to one prominent figure at Swansea. ‘It has been a dream,’ Michu says.

And what about the interest from other teams? ‘I am sorry, I know there was interest but I do not know what clubs they were.’

They are probably feeling quite sorry about it as well.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/fo...un-La-Liga-hes-flying-Swan.html#ixzz26MXR3W4t

 

Hate to burst your bubble mate but there's a thread on this already.

 

I wonder how much of that is true? Siggy delivered some important goals for us. Isn't that enough? I never understood Jason Scotland syndrome.

 

Knack, the complaint was about his work rate, not his goal scoring but, to be honest, I haven't yet seen a great deal of difference between the two. It was probably the other way round with poor Pintado. I was often shouted down here when I justified his lack of goals because of the way Sousa had him working his sphericals off. I'm just reading Ian Rush's autobiography, where he says he missed a lot of goals because his legs were like jelly either due to tiredness or after returning from injury and not being fully match fit. Something to remember when we have a go at certain individuals.

 

Good point IJ which I think MH (as nonesmate calls him), has told Danny not to run around like a headless chicken so he won't be tired in front of goal, if the chance comes his way in the later stages. When I first read that I thought is that a cop out, but it does make sense . Coming back to the thread though I bloody luvs him, and he was unlucky not to score our third against Sunderland his header was almost too good!

 

Two threads (good ones) identical so merged !

 

We are very blessed that he decided to come to us, seems a very humble person. I'm liking him more and more!!!

 

cracking player who will score plenty, Danny is playing better also if you discard his last game...Its our defense that needs to be upgraded now as i think that is our weakest link at the moment as even though players like monk and Tate will give 100% we still need younger with more pace players. Injury to Taylor and kyle has shown that we need quality players to share the defense duties, I like to be able to rotate players from time to time in the future without losing rhythm.......we never seem to get all departments spot on together but we are getting close to it...