Luis Campos, Paris Saint-Germain’s football advisor since 2022, gave a lengthy interview to Marca. The Portuguese executive revealed his working relationship with coach Luis Enrique, the club’s philosophy in daily operations and recruitment, including a fascinating anecdote about the signing of Willian Pacho (a 24-year-old defender) in the summer of 2024.
Luis Campos said, “In ten minutes, he had already told us everything we wanted to hear.”
Was it easy to convince Nasser Al Khelaifi that Luis Enrique was the ideal man for PSG?
Yes, it was very easy. (…) We started by examining a number of potential coaches and evaluating them according to 25 different criteria… all in order to find the perfect person. We finally met Luis Enrique at his home, and we clicked so well that in ten minutes, he had already told us everything we wanted to hear. After that meeting, I called Nasser and told him, “Mr. President, he’s the one we need.” It was done in two days. I felt such positive energy and such a strong will to win that I thought, “He’s the one.”
Luis Campos: “All the elements are in place for us to continue on the path to success.”
Is it possible to repeat the sextuple in the future?
We’d love to. We know it’s very difficult and that no one has managed to repeat this feat, but someone has to try to do better. This PSG project is
exciting because it’s a very young team that plays very attractive football, with an exceptional coach, management, and president. Everything is in place for us to continue on the path to success, and we certainly have the will to do so, even though we know that in football, it’s possible to play very well without winning.
Two years ago, also under Luis Enrique, we were eliminated in the semi-finals against Dortmund after hitting the woodwork five times. If just one shot had found the net, everything would have been different. But we have always progressed as a team. The team that finished last season had evolved considerably compared to the one that reached the semi-finals the previous year and won the championship.
Luis Campos: “He demands more and every day he comes up with something new.”
We can and must continue like this because I see the team’s progress in terms of development and taking on new responsibilities. Luis never stops; every day he demands more and every day he comes up with something new. I remember that after the first season, I was delighted with Luis and the new project. We had reached the semi-finals and won the championship, and we could still improve.
On the first day of the following season, Luis Enrique arrived and told me, “Luis, you’ll see, the players are going to change positions so much that the opponent won’t know where they are anymore.” “Wow!” I thought to myself, “What on earth is he going to come up with? What new ideas is he going to propose now?” And he was right.
During the fourth or fifth match, we were playing against Lille, and their captain, Benjamin André, who is 33 years old, came to see me at the end of the game and said, “Luis, I didn’t understand your team at all! I didn’t even know where the midfielders I was supposed to be marking were! They changed positions so much that it’s very difficult to play against you…” That’s when I realized we were building something better than the previous year.
And I still feel it today because, despite all the injuries we’ve had this year, the team remains fresh and performs well. I can already imagine what PSG will be like when all the players are available again and at the same level of physical and mental fitness. We will be very strong again, because that’s a daily requirement for everyone at the club, and especially for Luis Enrique during his training sessions.
Luis Campos: “If you don’t intend to train hard every day, don’t come.”
What’s it like working with Luis Enrique on a daily basis? Is he as much of a perfectionist, intense, and demanding as he seems?
Absolutely. He must sleep with his fingers plugged into an electrical socket, he has so much energy. Every day, he arrives with the desire to evolve, to progress. When we talk to a player about joining our project, we first present the collective sporting project, what PSG is all about, and then the individual project for the player, because these are two different things, and both are important.
There’s no point in recruiting good players if we don’t have a place for them. Luis Enrique asks me to tell each player one thing: “If you don’t intend to train hard every day, don’t come, because if you don’t train hard every day, Luis Enrique will ‘kill’ you very quickly.” You have to understand that every training session is like a match against the best team(s) in the world, and you’re going to have to give it your all every day.
At the end of his first season, he told me one day, “Luis, either we improve the level of our daily training sessions, making sure all the players train at full capacity, or I’m leaving.” He instilled that high standard in me. So today, when we’re looking to sign a player, the first thing I tell him is, “We know you well, but if you don’t train at 100% every day, forget it, you won’t play a single minute.” And it’s the truth.
Luis Campos: “My first year at PSG was very difficult.”
When you arrived at PSG, you found a squad of 52 players that you had to reduce to 28. The sporting director is always involved in recruiting players, but letting them go is certainly no easy task.
There are different types of sporting directors. I’m not a manager; my experience throughout my career is invaluable—as a coach, a player, and even a fitness coach… It allows me to support my coach in building his playing style. My first year at PSG was very difficult, but also very rewarding, because it gave me the opportunity to work with individually incredible players who didn’t mesh well together.
It’s like trying to assemble the Eiffel Tower with pieces from other spectacular works of art from around the world that don’t fit together. They’re still works of art, but they don’t harmonize. Financial Fair Play forced us to reduce the squad size, and I know from experience that it’s impossible for a coach to manage so many players.
The first year, we played very well at the start of the season, but after the World Cup, things got complicated: some players came back very happy, others depressed, still others injured, and the second half of the season was very difficult.
Luis Campos: “Despite all the respect and admiration we may have for individual talent, nothing is more important than the club.”
With the arrival of Luis Enrique, we began to build differently. We are not just looking for talent; we are also looking for competitiveness, a hunger to win, and a desire to play as a team. The club comes before the player. Commitment is paramount. It is essential to understand that, despite all the respect and admiration we may have for individual talent, nothing is more important than the club.
PSG is more important than any player; it has its own history and continues to build upon it. We have taken an important step and we want to go further. To do this, we understand that football is, and always will be, a team sport. I have heard it said that films create stars, but stars don’t make films.
It’s much the same for football: the collective allows individual talent to emerge. PSG is a good example. Today, everyone attacks, but everyone defends too. This allows us to be a team, to have a much stronger collective game. This is Luis Enrique’s great contribution to this project: the concept of teamwork.
Luis Campos: “This sometimes forces us to take strict, almost educational measures, as in the case of Dembélé at Arsenal.”
In top-level football, the most difficult thing is convincing stars to put their egos aside and use their talent for the benefit of the team.
It’s also a product of today’s society. I’m 61 years old; the world has evolved and is different. With social media, individualism is much more prevalent. Young people today have grown up with a much more individualistic sensibility, a less developed sense of teamwork than young people of the past.
That’s how society works, and it sometimes forces us to take strict, almost educational measures, as in the case of Dembélé at Arsenal—measures that help everyone understand that the club and the team’s playing style take precedence over their own individual goals. When we all play together, we are much stronger.
All players love to attack; When they have the ball, you don’t need to tell them to run. The hardest thing is getting them to defend together, as a team, with organization. Luis did that very well at PSG.
Luis Campos: “Football has undergone a great evolution.”
That’s where Luis Enrique truly shines. When the team doesn’t have the ball, Dembélé, who has won every individual award this year, throws himself at the opponent like a kamikaze to take it away.
Team leaders become leaders naturally; they don’t need to arrive and say, “I’m the leader, I’m the one who earns the most money.” It doesn’t work like that. A leader must lead by example. Luis embodies this leadership every day: “You have to defend like a madman, like an animal, and attack like an animal too.” Leaders must be able to convey this on the pitch.
Football has undergone a great evolution, a fact I try to make those around me understand, and which often sparks discussion. This great evolution isn’t about the physical aspect, as is often said. It is an evolution, certainly, but the real evolution, the one that explains a lot about the current Portuguese player, and the Spanish player as well, is the understanding of the game, the intellectual aspect, their cognitive abilities.
Luis Campos: “The second ball is more important than the first.”
That’s where the player makes the difference. Luis tells the players: “Don’t make mistakes. If you make mistakes, you’re not playing for me. Don’t throw yourselves into duels like madmen. The second ball is more important than the first.” When you hear that, you understand the importance of the cognitive aspect, the intellectual dimension, the understanding of the game.
Today, for a player, this ability to understand the game and make decisions on the field makes all the difference. Hearing this makes me think and increasingly convinces me to look for players who are more intelligent than physically gifted, because physical abilities are easy to develop, but the intellectual aspect and understanding of the game are more difficult.
Luis Campos: “Fabián isn’t very fast, nor exceptionally elegant, but he’s very intelligent on the pitch.”
Listening to you, I think of Vitinha and his understanding of the game.
Fabián Ruiz: Fabián isn’t very fast, nor exceptionally elegant, but he’s very intelligent on the pitch. Kroos, Modric… They are cerebral midfielders, and if you add to that the incredible energy of a João Neves or a Zaire-Emery… The intellectual aspect of the game has become vital today in every position.
Building a team means looking for players who can run, we agree, but also players who are mentally strong enough to withstand all the pressure that big clubs demand: so many matches, finals, national team selections, and the need to adapt to the national team coach’s instructions, to a style of play different from that of the club. This leads to considerable wear and tear. To all these demands, you have to add the ability to think about the game, to understand it.
Is the star the club, the team, or Luis Enrique?
Everyone. Luis likes to talk about his time at PSG; he has a lot of influence here and he knows perfectly well how important he was for us. He’s happier with the team’s victories than with his individual successes; he’s a good example of that. He knows very well that when the team wins, he wins too. These statistics, however important they may be, are nothing compared to the pleasure we get from watching the team play and seeing him train every day.
Luis Campos: “Luis Enrique would tell me about his objectives, and I’d reply, ‘In three years.’ He’d say, ‘No, no, this year.’”
In terms of collective performance, PSG and Arsenal are a cut above the rest.
In terms of team play, we went very quickly from a team criticized for its excessive individualism to the team Luis Enrique wanted. The change was faster than I imagined. Luis Enrique would tell me about his objectives, and I’d say, ‘In three years.’ He’d say, ‘No, no, this year.’
We went very quickly from an individualistic style of play to a collective one, and successfully so, because without results, everything becomes more complicated. For us, it was a real lesson: in football, to win, you have to play as a team.” You can win the title of best defender, best midfielder or top scorer, but if the team doesn’t win, it’s all for nothing.
Luis Campos: “Finding talent driven by the will to win.”
Is it easy to make this decision with a coach who has such a strong vision? How does he discuss it with you and the president?
It comes from the intelligence of both the coach and the president. At PSG, we form a trio that works wonderfully. I have a strong personality, Luis Enrique has a very strong personality, and so does Nasser Al-Khelaïfi, but our success is based on mutual respect. We respect each other enormously, we listen to each other, and we understand each other.
Luis knew that in the first year, he wouldn’t get everything he wanted, because it’s impossible to transform an entire team in a single year. Little by little, we’ve managed it; we’ve looked for players whose playing style matches his, and we’ll continue along this path. That’s why, in theory, after these three years, we should be stronger, but Luis said, “No, no, we’re going to be stronger now.”
We’re increasingly looking for player profiles that fit his project, his style of play, and his vision of the game. For example, the idea of recruiting young players. At PSG, it’s not just about spotting young players, but about finding talent driven by the will to win. Because what matters to us isn’t talent alone, but the thirst for competition.
The anecdote about Pacho’s recruitment.
Are artificial intelligence and big data transforming recruitment, or is the most important thing ultimately having that knack for spotting talent?
I believe that technology will never surpass the human element, because our ability to feel remains stronger than all the data we’re given. I love technology, but in the end, I need to feel, to see, to perceive, to know… Often, it comes from a player’s attitude, a lunch, a dinner, a walk, from listening to them or understanding a gesture.
Pacho is a good example. When I first contacted him, he was in Ecuador, and I told him, “I’m coming to see you to present the club’s project.” He replied, “Mr. Luis Campos, you’re saying PSG wants to sign me? I’ll be in Madrid tomorrow! I’ll arrive at 9 a.m.” Wow! I called Luis Enrique: “This guy will give everything for us.” His attitude showed me that I’d found someone hungry for victory.
I already knew him from playing, but he also made a very good impression on me. I went from Paris to Madrid, we spent the day together, and at the end, I thought to myself, “He has to come to PSG.” Shortly after their first meeting, Luis Enrique was already discussing tactics with him, what he expected of him, how he should behave on the pitch… It was a wonderful moment. Pacho’s story perfectly illustrates our policy.
Luis Campos: “We couldn’t let Kylian’s situation affect everyone at the club, however talented he may be.”
Things aren’t always easy or idyllic at PSG. Two years ago, the club went through a difficult period with Kylian Mbappé’s last season and his tumultuous transfer to Real Madrid. How does the sporting director handle such a situation?
“I’ve had a special relationship with Kylian since he was 14 or 15. I won’t forget that, and I won’t hide it, but in this situation, I tried to remain as detached and rational as possible. I always thought about protecting the team and the other players. We couldn’t let Kylian’s situation affect everyone at the club, however talented he may be.
My concern, shared by the coach and the club’s management, was to make sure that everyone else felt valued.” We managed to manage some emotions, because Kylian is still the captain of the French team, he is still the same player, but at the same time, we had to protect the club and all those who had agreed to join the PSG project.
