The birth.
The coach started his career the same day as the footballer.
Because Mauricio Pochettino started playing at Newell's under the command of Marcelo Bielsa and that implies an ant industry and teacher attention.
With Bielsa, soccer is meditated, studied and rehearsed before playing.
Later, his career as a center-back who scored hard and made little mistakes reached its peak at PSG and the Argentine national team.
At the end of his career, the coach he wanted to be met with the pedagogical generosity of Xabier Azkargorta, who in endless talks gave him back conceptual walls analyzing every corner of football.
They drew systems and invented problems to which they sought solutions.
To be honest: two crazy people rambling.
But the obsessives give good results in the intense world of football and Pochettino launched himself without a lifeguard to rescue a Espanyol that was sinking.
It was 2009 and the coach was born.
The development.
A discreet guy, who privileges human relationships and hates exhibitionism because he believes that the only ones who deserve to take center stage are the players.
His football aspires to prominence, but it is tied neither to a system nor to a style.
Its flexible intelligence is open to whatever solution your team is comfortable with and your rivals uncomfortable.
Of course, in his creed courage is always better, because he is a brave guy.
He conquered England from Southampton, where he arrived without knowing a word of English and discovered young people who enriched the English team.
Later he took Tottenham to the highest place in their history.
As it puts institutional values before any other issue, if Tottenham decides to build a stadium instead of buying players, it adapts and reaches a Champions League final.
If he is later fired for not meeting the expectations that he himself created, he leaves without opening his mouth.
The base camp.
Loyal to his team of collaborators, hard-working, meticulous, competitive, attentive to the quarry, empathetic in personal relationships.
This is Mauricio Pochettino, who will have to put a scalpel soft as a feather to PSG, for the surgery that their great figures need.
It will do it with the ease of common sense and without haste, but when we look into perspective a little while later, a revolution will have taken place.
He has always known how to activate the nerve fibers of his teams, ensuring the delivery of his players.
He has always known how to play the right keys, finding a stable base in his equipment.
He has always known how to trust young people, refreshing competitive behavior.
PSG is not like any of its "always", but where Mauricio has gone, he has managed to grow up to the challenge.
The top.
Pochettino is used to carrying large, heavy stones to the top of the mountain.
As PSG is one of the highest peaks in world football, reaching the top will be more difficult.
Mauricio knows this well because he has been looking up for years and dreaming of this moment.
You don't have to ask what you have to do to succeed because we have known the answer since Qatar put its interest and prestige in the French club: win.
What?
In principle, everything.
Because PSG is one of those clubs that call defeats a crisis and the art of surviving them is part of what they demand of the coach.
It will be the price to pay for the dream come true.
The prize, if all goes well, is very big.
Losing or winning, the next day they will find Pochettino working to find the return to the next match.
Looking forward, that is where dreams and challenges live.