Regarded as a footballing great, Johan Cruyff, 62, shone on the pitch as a player and on the touchline as a manager.

The former Holland international is now about to play a different sort of game. As the new coach of the Catalan football team, Cruyff has become a figurehead for nationalist aspirations in the northeastern region of Spain. There is, however, one embarrassing hitch for Catalan nationalists championing their star signing: Cruyff refuses to speak Catalan, the regional language. Instead, the new manager will address his players in Spanish.

Catalonia, in northeast Spain, is a fiercely nationalist corner of the country, which regards itself as a nation, promotes its language internationally and runs “embassies” around the world.

All lessons in state schools are in Catalan and pupils are taught only three hours of Spanish a week. A language law forces businesses to use Catalan or face fines. The language, and the region’s aspirations for an international team, have political connotations for Catalan nationalists, who run the regional government.

The same is also the case in the Basque Country, which has been campaigning to have its “national” football team recognised for years, without success.

Fifa and its European equivalent, Uefa, refuse to recognise the Catalan and Basque sides in the same way as teams from Scotland, Wales or Northern Ireland. Both regional sides must content themselves with friendly matches against international teams. Catalan nationalists, who have been campaigning for years to overturn this opposition, now hope that Cruyff’s name may raise their profile and change international opinion.

Jordi Casals, president of the Catalan Football Federation (FCF), said: “It doesn’t worry me that he doesn’t speak Catalan, rather that the Catalan team is recognised internationally.”

Cruyff, who is ranked alongside Pelé and Maradona, has lived in Catalonia for years but never learnt Catalan and is said to speak Spanish badly.

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