For everyone involved, the atmosphere of a TV interview at the training ground of a major football club is usually at the rarefied end of the scale. This one is with Pedro González López – better known as Pedri – so it’s important that everything is spot on. 

In truth, the empty room we’ve been given is functional and dull – two things we don’t want the interview to be. However, there’s nothing dull about the activity taking place: there’s a whirl of moving parts and participants, busy constructing the ‘studio’ where part of this interview will be filmed. It’s an intricate, intense and necessarily efficient business. A cameraman, two cameras worth tens of thousands of pounds, a producer, spotlights, backdrops, microphones, three club press officers, an interviewer (me) and… the player. 

Pedri appears to be in the eye of this hurricane of activity, unruffled and unperturbed. It makes a great metaphor for how Pedri plays – what it looks like when rivals fret and flock around him, trying to shackle his elegant imposition of intelligence upon Europe’s football fields. But, right now, accompanying that preternatural calm is a gently amused smile. It is neither sardonic nor condescending; rather, it is the smile of someone who is deeply self-assured. And, importantly, it reaches his eyes. 

Anyway, to the interview, where Pedri makes it clear that this laidback demeanour doesn’t evaporate in the heat of battle. “My first club in Tenerife, Tegueste, were big on values,” he says. “They instilled in us the idea that we shouldn’t get angry during matches or argue with the referee – there’s no point! They also taught us to have fun. Now, these days I do get angry occasionally. That’s normal. But the self-discipline to stay calm and do better next time you’re on the ball can make the difference.”

Not to overdo the theme, but Pedri’s self-possession also helped him govern the emotions of moving to the Camp Nou in 2020. Just over two and a half years before, he’d been on trial at Real Madrid’s Valdebebas training ground, which was a miserable experience: it was snowy, training was disrupted and those in charge told him he wasn’t yet at their level. So, turning up at Barcelona with the impression that he might be put under contract only to be immediately loaned out meant guarantees were in short supply.