Gaetan Bong spoke to the matchday magazine ahead of the Huddersfield Town match earlier in the season. Below is an extract from the interview.
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First up Gaetan, do you think we’ve made a lot of progress this season?
I think we started slowly but we adapted pretty well to the Premier League. We are a better team now than we were at the start of the season; we have more confidence and we know that we can win games. We worked hard, and we’ve made good steps in this league.
Was there any turning point in the campaign for you?
I wouldn’t single out one game; I think every game we’ve played has been important. We’ve learnt together, we’ve grown together, and we’ve found a way to stand up and reach the next level. What I do think has helped is when we started to win games at home. We won a couple of times towards the start of the season at home but it wasn’t enough; it was when we started winning at home after Christmas that was important. We played well in that period and the new players had adapted to the team. Every game is important though; even a defeat. Obviously the fans want us to win every game but in the Premier League we know that is not always possible; but the most important thing is how you react after a defeat and I think we have shown the character to react.
Your first Premier League game was at the Emirates. Was that a good experience?
In the beginning, as children, we love football and we all want to play on the big stage, in the big stadiums. It’s a dream to be there and when you so get that opportunity as men, it’s just so different because it is your job. You are there to do a job, you’re not there to enjoy the occasion. Maybe after the game, if you’ve won, you can enjoy it, but if you lose it’s even worse because you feel like you had this big opportunity but you didn’t do enough. Even if you have played well you are still upset because you want to win.
When you’re playing in front of 60,000 in these big stadiums, can that affect you?
When you play these games, you need to separate the emotion; you are there to do a job. It’s the same when I play against friends in games; they see a different Gaetan Bong on the pitch to the one they know off it, and sometimes they can’t believe that. I tell them, ‘yeah, I’m bad on the pitch’ and that’s because I’m doing my job. I’m not a friend then, I’m just another guy doing my job. Afterwards I can laugh with them, but during the game sometimes I don’t even remember them because I am so focused on my job. On the pitch it’s important that you find a way to become someone else. I am nice off the pitch but on it you just have to be bad; and by that I mean still being respectful and, of course, playing fair.
The guys say you’re even like that in training. You don’t mind putting a tackle in…
Even the boss sometimes asks me, but I say, ‘sorry boss, that’s me’. I’m just so switched on when I’m on the pitch’. It just comes naturally for me. It just comes from the soul; it’s the way I am. It’s the way my body reacts and it reacts to the way I have been playing for many years. This is the feeling I have and that doesn’t change, whether I’m in the big stadiums like the Emirates or playing against any other Premier League or Championship team.
So, you have a different persona on the pitch but you still look like you have a smile on your face and enjoy what you do…
I enjoy working hard. It’s the toughest thing to do; even when your legs and burning or maybe when you’ve made a mistake, the next moment is a new situation, you never know what’s going to happen, so you have to keep working hard. If you don’t work hard, we all know what’s going to happen so I am always giving 100 per cent – and that’s what I enjoy, giving everything for the team. You sometimes see footballers where something is missing, and that’s often because they don’t enjoy working hard. You can’t be the best footballer can be if you don’t work hard and even if it’s gone wrong for you on the pitch, as long as you’ve left everything out there, then that’s all you can do.
When you do well against these top players, does it make you more confident?
I can’t speak for the rest of the lads but it doesn’t given me any more confidence than I already have. I am always confident in my own head and I’m working hard every day in training to make sure my body is good on the day when I need it to be good. This is the hardest thing when you’re a professional; you know what you can do, but it’s about making sure you peak on the day, when it matters most. When we win it’s always good for the confidence of the team though, because you know what you can do for each other on the pitch, you have trust in your team-mates, so you can just get on and focus on your own job.
How have you found the Premier League in general?
One thing I’ve learnt about the Premier League is that one game you can play against Arsenal, a very good team with nice players and who play nice football, and the week after you have something completely different: a team that doesn’t want to play football, just long ball and fighting – it’s a battle. People ask if there’s a big difference between the Championship and this league and I would say that in this league you have to be adaptable. In the Championship every week you have the same, playing teams who want to fight – okay, there might be some teams who like to play a little bit better but overall it’s a physical battle, whereas in the Premier League every team brings a different challenge and has its own identity, its own character. You have to be adaptable in every single game.