THE first words from Josep Gombau when he spoke exclusively to The Advertiser in his maiden interview since winning the Adelaide United coaching job were breathtaking.

"I WANT to make Adelaide United play one football style.

''This style is what I learned. It's the style that I know from Barcelona and that's to play attacking football.

"A 1-4-3-3 formation and playing this style, trying to keep possession of the ball to try to play beautiful football for the fans, Adelaide United fans.

"Everybody will enjoy this style.

"We know all about total football and what we want to try to do is to make Adelaide have a philosophy of football.

"When you will see players like that you will recognise that Adelaide United is playing."

Gombau came across as a man who knows exactly what he wants and more importantly how to deliver the ideals that have emanated from the revered FC Barcelona blueprint.

He told the story of how he helped Barcelona's former boss Pep Guardiola - Barca's most successful coach in history - earn his UEFA professional licence while he was an academy coach at La Masia, the club's training base.

Gombau also became very close to current Barca boss Tito Vilanova when he coached Vilanova's son at the Barca academy.

"I have two different relationships with them (Guardiola and Vilanova)," Gombau said.

"With Pep Guardiola when he went for his licence to coach he needed to practice.

"I had the pro licence before he did and he asked to practice his licence at Barca.

"I knew Guardiola then, and I knew from then he would make a very good coach.

"At the time I was coaching (Barcelona academy) under-10s and he took the practice very seriously.

"My relationship with Tito is different because I coached his son.

"It was the year before Tito went with Guardiola to coach Barca B.

"We have had a lot of time to talk.

"We travelled a lot with the teams because he, like a father, followed his son.

"We had lunches and dinner together and he explained to me that the Barca club offered Pep Guardiola to coach Barca B and he was going to be the second coach."

But for all his experience with Barca royalty Gombau, 36, was a bolter for the Reds' two-year coaching term.

Adelaide went on a global hunt to track down a mentor that would come in and change the poisoned Reds culture which had grown legs since the departure of former boss Rini Coolen in December 2011.

But sceptics have been having pop shots at Gombau's Adelaide United appointment, mainly on social media.

They're questioning the reasons why the former Barcelona youth technical director and academy schools boss had left Spain to coach Kitchee in Hong Kong for four years.

Gombau has now become Adelaide United's seventh coach to lead the Reds in nearly a decade of existence.

He has been very successful with Kitchee in the four years with the club. Hong Kong, however, is not exactly a powerhouse of the Asian Football Confederation.

But the Catalonian-born mentor, who started coaching at just 23, has done the hard yards.

Gombau was a 183cm goalkeeper for third-division CF Amposta when he decided to pursue a career off the field, but he hasn't only been cocooned in the five-star Barca environment.

He started his career as technical director of the Amposta youth teams, progressed to coach Barcelona academy youth teams and was technical director of Barca's schools and Catalonia clubs.

Friendly approach ends on sideline

JOSEP Gombau says critics need to make up their own minds about his coaching philosophies.

Gombau was a little uncomfortable when asked what type of manager he is, but said there are certain rules his new Adelaide United crop need to follow.

"It's not my job to answer this question and say "Josep is like this or that'," he said. "But what I like is to be honest and to speak clear and to speak face-to-face.

"Outside the field I am very friendly and inside the field I am not like that.

"Because it's my job, it's the future for my family and when it's time for work I am like that.

"When I go out I am very friendly a man that likes relationships with everybody.

"But you can see two Joseps.

"One is very friendly and the other as a coach I am different.

"I want to speak with the players and everybody is the same for me. But when you say on the first day the rules then everybody must follow the rules."

TV link

Josep Gombau says his first connections with Australian soccer arrived via former Socceroo and SBS chief football analyst Craig Foster and a Melbourne-based agent.

Foster has been a strong advocate of FC Barcelona's philosophies for years while agent Manny Seisdedos contacted Gombau after he arrived in Hong Kong to coach Kitchee.

"I know Manny Seisdedos from Australia and he came here and talked to me about coaching Australia and that was my first contact with Australia," Gombau said.

"I know Craig Foster and he's a colleague - sometimes I call him and he calls me.

"My relationship happened after his brother (Paul) was a coach in Hong Kong (for Sapling).

"His brother's team played against me sometimes and he told Craig that I'm a successful coach in Hong Kong and one day he contacted me and spoke to me on the phone.

"He told me that my next step should be Australia.

"After the announcement that I was the coach of Adelaide he sent me an SMS and congratulated me.

"I've never met him in person."