Barcelona's Sporting Director Andoni Zubizarreta full of praise for "humble" Luis Suárez for issuing an apology to Giorgio Chiellini
Barcelona sporting director Andoni Zubizarreta has praised Luis Suárez for apologising to Italian defender Giorgio Chiellini and called the striker “humble” for owning up to his mistake.
On his apology, Zubizarreta said: “Suárez has shown he is humble enough to admit an error, which is very important. He has been humble enough to apologise to those he has affected, because it happened in the middle of a festival of football. In this case it’s the best thing a person can do.”
The striker is the club’s prime transfer target this summer and the former Barça and Spain goalkeeper was keen to highlight Suárez’s footballing qualities as well. “Everyone knows that Luis is an excellent player, everyone knows last season he played in various positions in attack, but everyone also knows that he is a Liverpool player.”
Even new signing Ivan Rakitic, in whose presentation Zubizarreta was speaking, was full of praise for the Uruguayan striker. The Croatian midfielder said: “The fact he has had the character and the strength to go in front of everyone and say sorry says a lot about him as a person. Not every person has that strength to admit they have done something stupid. I rarely say that I am wrong so this says a lot about him, he has shown the character and strength he has so he should be commended for that.
Rakitic also added that Suarez’s “quality is unquestionable” Barcelona’s latest recruit said: “Regardless of whether the club signs him or not, his quality is unquestionable. He has shown a lot of quality with Uruguay and scored more than 30 goals [last season] with Liverpool, so he has the necessary quality to play for Barça.”
Although the Liverpool striker has been banned from playing football for four months by FIFA, he is still highly regarded by Barcelona and his public apology might be just what Barcelona are looking for.