After 670 games with Barça and 114 with the national team, Sergio Busquets has not run out of wisdom or physical strength to give another football lesson in the great hall that is the Santiago Bernabéu. The Barça number 5 continues to honor the shirt that one day he decided to bequeath to him, expressly and exclusively, his no less renowned and illustrious predecessor: Carles Puyol.
Another old compadre of his youth has come, Xavi Hernandez, to rescue Busquets from the slide towards the sunset, pushed by criticism and, also, by the different role he was playing in the field, moving further and further away from the midfielder model for which he was enlightened and exalted 14 years ago.
It remains the same, for the good and the little bad. He is austere even on the pitch, which is a virtue. Save even on passes. 78% of those he gave on Sunday against Real Madrid gave them one (36%) and two touches (42%), and in the remaining 17 passes he gave three touches to the ball (10) or more. Busquets was not entertained until minute 91, when he gave six consecutive touches to the leather. At that time, Courtois was seen going to two pressures, something as unusual as it was unnecessary.
The captain of Barca intervened 84 times in the 90 minutes. He missed three passes, but gave three vertical services that left Alba, Pedri and Ferran behind the defense with a clear advantage. He lost four balls, recovered 12, made two fouls and received two. He saw a card for grabbing Milito, who started a counterattack, and generated two, to Kroos and Camavinga.
Busquets has played 40 of the 41 games of the season, 97%: he only missed Mallorca because he was suspended.
They are just numbers. Excellent, without being the best, because Jordi Alba made more passes and Eric Garcia had a better passing percentage. The images help describe the deployment of Busquets in the white coliseum. According to the heat map, it could be deduced that it was the Camp Nou.
The Barça midfielder, therefore the most delayed midfielder and closest to the centrals, spent more time in the theoretical position of midfielder than midfielder. That is to say, he stepped on the outskirts of Courtois’s area more than Ter Stegen’s. The comparison with Casemiro, his counterpart in Madrid, the leader of the League, helps to assess Xavi’s proposal in contrast to Carlo Ancelotti’s in the direct duel.
Barça was exhibited at the Bernabéu, again, and away from the glare of the flashes, something that has been frequent since it ceased to be a novelty in the first team, Busquets, in his invisibility, left the trail of the aroma of football that he spread Xavi’s eleven. That smell that remains in the atmosphere for a long time to run. He finished the game speaking to the Movistar microphones. This time with a half smile on his face, after having eaten several browns from previous defeats. The team cheered him as he entered the locker room.
Busquets: “We weren’t thinking about the result, but we were thinking about playing the game we’ve played, being protagonists, having the ball, pressing up front”. #The classic # LaCasaDelFútbol pic.twitter.com/x0X9RhnzKv
– Soccer on Movistar Plus+ (@MovistarFutbol) March 20, 2022
Everyone cheered for him, for being the captain and for being the guy who always helps out on the pitch; sometimes offering a passing lane, sometimes darkening dragging an opponent, knowing what the needs of the group are, already losing the desire for prominence if he ever had it. But he is everywhere, always essential, as the numbers proclaim. Luis Enrique has taken pity on him and has given him rest in the national team.
Busi! Busi! Busi! Busi! pic.twitter.com/Arllhixzuu
— FC Barcelona (@FCBarcelona_es) March 22, 2022
irreplaceable sacred cows
The captain has played 91% of the possible minutes. He is only surpassed by Ter Stegen; Behind appear Alba and Piqué.
Xavi doesn’t do it because Barça doesn’t play friendlies, so Busquets is the player in the squad who has played the most games (40 of 41, 97% of the total) and the first from the field in minutes (3,429 of 3,750 possible, 91%), after Ter Stegen. they follow spark plug the other sacred cows of the squad.
It is known that Alba has no substitute, in the absence of another left back. Gerard Piqué competes with five more central defenders (Araujo, Mingueza, Eric and Lenglet, plus Umtiti, injured) and owns one of the two places. Busquets, who will turn 34 on July 16, only the first game of the year has been lost: the visit to Mallorca. I was sanctioned.
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“Busi is an essential player.” Xavi mentioned that phrase when he returned from the defeat against Madrid in Saudi Arabia (2-3), and before Barça also fell in the Cup in San Mamés. It was mid-January.
He remains “essential,” “irreplaceable,” “spectacular” and “paramount,” the coach said Saturday, showering him with praise, grateful to a pupil who is also a friend. “He has given an outrageously good performance, and yet he has been criticized as the most. Imagine the one that will fall to those who come from behind”, predicted Xavi, who already went through that phase when he was a player. Poor.