Rodri overlooks Pep Guardiola when naming Man City's most important figure

Rodri has claimed that Manchester City's director of football Txiki Begiristain is the most important figure at the club.

Speaking while on City's pre-season tour of the United States, the 26-year-old midfielder — who signed a three-year contract extension with City last week — was asked about the importance of Begiristain, the man at the heart of City's transfer dealings.

"For me he [Begiristain] is the most important part of the club right now," said Rodri. "The guy who says who comes, who goes, the one who builds the teams.

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"It's not easy, it's tricky. You have to be clever and understand... you have to speak languages, you have to be smart, you have to be a good negotiator, many things that are of course important."

It's hard to disagree with the Spanish star, even if it means overlooking Pep Guardiola as the most important figure at the club.

While Guardiola of course has his input on who he would like the club to sign, it is his close friend Begiristain who ultimately has control of City's wallet. It's Begiristain who managed to recoup a combined £92.5m for Raheem Sterling and Gabriel Jesus despite both players entering the final years of their contracts, and it was he who worked through months and months of negotiations to get the Erling Haaland deal done.

Rodri is perhaps not your typical elite footballer; he has academic interests away from the pitch, in particular business studies and economics which he studied at university while playing.

However, when asked if he might follow in Txiki's footsteps one day, he wasn't so sure. "Maybe!" he laughed. "I think more [likely] than [being] the coach. More than the coach."

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