January signing Chimy Avila has claimed that he has changed his attitude and will not respond to aggression from other players on the pitch, despite garnering something of a reputation in recent years for reckless tackles. The Argentine was also criticised for his exit strategy from Osasuna, but reasoned he was simply desperate to move to Real Betis.
Osasuna Sporting Director Braulio Vazquez revealed he was not happy with how Avila and his agent engineered a move, publicly applying pressure on Los Rojillo. The 30-year-old told Marca that he was only honest with his statements that he wanted to move.
“Many things have happened to me to be able to get here. They love Chimy Avila for being sincere and not for lying, I prefer to be hated for being sincere than for being a liar. I had many things on the table and with Osasuna we believed that it was time to separate our paths because it was good for both of us. And when my representative told me that there was this opportunity, I got rid of all the other offers on the table to go for it, I never hesitated. I thank the other clubs for their interest and I did whatever was necessary to go to Betis.”
He explained that no matter what the opposition did to him going forward, Chimy Avila would not be getting into disciplinary issues.
“Maybe I ask the fans [to give me support] because I know they can give me something. It gives me an energy that sometimes I can’t stop, that’s why the cards come… On the one hand I am calm because I have made a change in my life and in sports, change of mobile number, name on the shirt backwards,”
“Today they can slap me on the pitch and I promise I won’t react. I’m going to show it to you by running into space, colliding cleanly, playing for my team. They will say that they are hitting me and I am not the Chimy of before, but I am not going to go in, they can hit me as much as they want, like against Alaves, when it seemed disrespectful to me that a colleague wiped their blood off on my shirt. The camera watches if I kick, but if as players we don’t set an example, those outside won’t.”
Ahead of their recent game against Athletic Club, teammates Pablo Fornals and Aitor Ruibal were also seen talking in the tunnel about Avila, warning about the prospect of him getting into conflict with the Basque players.
“I am a happy person, Chimy is happy again on the pitch, being the Chimy who came to Spain in search of a dream. And on top of that, people show you that they give you everything in this great club to be happy. They asked me about the video of Fornals and Aitor and I took it with grace because I told him ‘Pablo, never show your weakness to the opposition.’ These days you take things differently, the bad things no longer affect you, only the positive. We players are the first ones who want to win, we must always be happy.”
