Jeg ved ikke om det er blevet postet herinde, men her er et ret nuanceret blik på Cesc i Barca:
Love story gone wrong – Why Cesc Fàbregas never gained Camp Nou’s affection
by Jen Evelyn | Posted on Thursday, June 12th, 2014
The day Cesc Fàbregas posed on the Camp Nou grass upon his presentation as a Barcelona player – wearing the blaugrana jersey for the first time since his departure at a tender age of 16 – didn’t give any indication of how rough the Catalan-born midfielder’s journey in his hometown club would end up being.
Once tipped to be Xavi Hérnandez’s heir, an addition to Barcelona’s already imposing midfield talent, Fàbregas became a recluse in Catalonia, and instead of hearing the applause, got used to the Camp Nou faithful whistling at him and his performances. Now on his way to Chelsea after the World Cup, it’s hard to say what exactly went wrong for Fàbregas in Barcelona.
Barcelona’s transfer policy hasn’t always been as immaculate as the peak of their footballing excellence. The cameras focus their lenses on the stars, but the transfers the people in Barcelona aren’t comfortable talking about have in fact been more frequent in the last years, than the ones that have ended in a success story.
The reason the likes of Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Alex Song, Alexis Sanchez and the forgotten names such as Dimitar Chygrynskiy and Martin Caceres have had such difficulties adapting to Barcelona’s style of play is that the very style of play is a result of a fundamental process that starts on a youth level and continues all the way to the first team. While we often talk about football, it’s also the mentality that sets La Masia graduates and “outsiders” apart; The fragile ecosystem is upheld by people who know the club, its values and its ways of working better than they know the insides of their own pockets.
When Cesc Fàbregas arrived, however, no one talked about an outsider. He was a prodigal son, and while the Catalan papers manifested his “Barca-DNA”, there wasn’t ever any question that the former Arsenal skipper would slot in effortlessly. Such idea was only powered by his goals and assists, and a seemingly powerful connection with former youth-team colleague Lionel Messi.
For a lot of the time, the connection was still there. The statistics tell us that the goals and the assists, too, were still there. 8 goals and 13 assists in the past season’s La Liga puts Fàbregas near the pole position, when comparing him with all the midfielders in Europe. A look deeper beneath the numbers, however, reveals the reason for Fàbregas being sold by Barcelona, and also shows why the fans have been frequently frustrated with him.
Since the beginning of February, Fàbregas has scored one goal and given three assists. Two of those assists came in a 6-0 win over Rayo Vallecano, and when it mattered the most, Fàbregas suddenly looked like a disjointed part in an already struggling Barcelona unit.
The same has happened in each of Fàbregas’ seasons in Catalonia. From August to December he has been in firing form, hailed as one of the greatest midfielders in Europe. From Christmas on, his form has dropped evidently, the contrast from the beginning of the season to the end of it has been drastic.
Perhaps drawing such conclusion, however, is premature unless we talk about Barcelona as a unit, too. The drop in form has not happened to only Fàbregas, it has happened to the entire Barcelona squad that has crashed out of the Champions League final three years in a row, after disappointing performances in the semifinal stage, and this year, in the quarter final stage against Atlético Madrid.
While it’s hard to put Barcelona’s fall from grace entirely on Fàbregas, it is, however, easy to see why he is among those who have received the most criticism. Out of all Barcelona’s midfielders, Fàbregas is the one who is dispossessed most times per game (0.9), according to WhoScored. He’s the one whose pass success percentage is the lowest (87.2), despite being the one who attempts least passes on average (59.1). Not to mention, he’s the one who concedes more fouls per game (1.2) than any other Barcelona midfielder, even more than the defensive midfielder Sergio Busquets.
In conclusion, you see Fàbregas in a negative light more often than any of his other midfield colleagues. When the collective frustration of the fans reaches a certain boiling point – like it has in Barcelona – the one that gets the most of the blame is the one who you see in a negative context more often than others. When a match ends in a draw or a loss, you easily remember the man who lost the ball, or gave away fouls. When that happens more often than once, the player ends up being criticized in a manner that perhaps isn’t always reasonable.
Even that kind of statistical comparison, though, isn’t entirely fair. Fàbregas played as a false 9 a total of 10 times last season, and quite logically, playing up front with your back towards the goal a lot of the time, you’re more prone to losing the ball. Lionel Messi, for example, is dispossessed over double the amount per match in comparison with Fàbregas, and although the Argentine, too, has been criticized a lot, being dispossessed relatively often has always been a part of Messi’s game, even when he has collected the praise of every pundit in the world of football.
Bearing that in mind, there must be something else, too, to explain why Fàbregas became one of the least-loved players in the Barcelona squad.
The answer could be found when looking at the statistics on dribbles per game. Lionel Messi and Andrés Iniesta attempt 4.4 and 2.7 dribbles respectively, while Fàbregas’s number is only 0.8. While Fàbregas isn’t the dribbler-type anyway, his inability to leave his markers, and on the other hand, his inability to pull the strings with perfectly weighed, timed and aimed passes like Xavi, is a combination that leaves the viewer confused as to what Fàbregas’ exact role is. There are few players on the pitch who run more than he does or fight harder than he does, but when it came to his input in the big matches, it was too often hard to tell what he was supposed to achieve with those runs.
Messi, Iniesta and of course Neymar, are the dribblers, the magicians, who have freedom on the pitch. Xavi is the orchestrator, the one who never misses a pass and who calms the game down, dictates the tempo. Busquets is the man in the shadow who loses the ball very rarely, who positions himself immaculately, and who, thankfully, both Barcelona fans and football experts have learned to appreciate in the last years.
What is Fàbregas? He has a bit of everything, a good shot, a good vision. A good passing ability. A good eye for runners and runs that he himself can make. But Fàbregas doesn’t really have a special quality, like Messi and Iniesta’s dribbling, like Xavi’s calm passing, like Busquets’ positioning.
And even after drawing that conclusion, it’s impossible to deny that Fàbregas is a quality player. But whether he lost it during his stay in England or whether he just never had it, it’s certain that Fàbregas doesn’t have a special quality about him that sets him apart from the rest. Add that to the fact that he doesn’t have a clear role – is he a deep-lying midfielder, a play maker, a wide midfielder or a forward? – and he often seems confused on the pitch. In the meantime, he leaves everyone else confused as well. Thereby, there’s clear logic to why his mistakes are criticized more than those of the others, in the time and age when the entire Barcelona is criticized a lot.
And in the end, it’s not a question of whether it’s fair or not. It’s football. It’s emotion, disappointment, frustration, and it often needs an outlet. Fàbregas is an easy outlet, and ultimately, that’s one of the biggest reasons for why he leaves, despite his good statistics. Perhaps he wasn’t ever the biggest problem. But perhaps he wasn’t the solution either. And perhaps, having never received the unconditional affection of the Camp Nou crowd, Fàbregas himself, too, got tired.
As Fàbregas moves back to England, it’s likely that he moves to the place where he’s supposed to be. To the country that complements his strengths, to a league where there’s a little more space on the field, to a league that has always appreciated those who can do a bit of everything. Perhaps to a team where the attacking play will be built around him, like it was at Arsenal. And it’s not a bad bet at all to put your money on him flourishing. But if anything, the past three years have showed that Barcelona, the place that was supposed to be his footballing home, is everything but his footballing home, and as the club and the player part ways, it might just be the right decision for both.
Jeg regner med de har det på, så de ikke slidder i den hellige dragt mens de kæmper alt hvad de kan!