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Sitting on the bench, Fernando Santos, the Portuguese coach, scratched his forehead on the edge of half-time while his face showed a certain weariness. As if this friendly, shoehorn into the tight schedule, was an extreme nuisance. But it wasn’t that. Or not alone. His team did not finish spinning a single play against a more than successful Spain. Cristiano was bored and his defense suffered. On the other side, Luis Enrique he got tired of applauding his players. In his quest to find the perfect team, the Asturian tries and tests players, and for now almost everyone responds to him. There you have one of those blessed problems that coaches love so much. In Lisbon he took good note of the good performance of several footballers who still do not feel headlines, but who are accumulating merits like little ants. Yesterday it was the turn of a Dani Olmo that, with hardly any noise, is gaining in confidence every time the national elastic is put on. In this still little recognizable Spain talents are emerging with the desire to assume an orphan leadership beyond Sergio Ramos. Without reaching the explosion that the appearance of Ansu Fati supposed a month ago, Olmo’s good work managed to get a smile from the most skeptical of the national team.
It is a curious case of the playmaker. At the age of 16, as captain of the Barça cadet, he received a strange offer to go to Dinamo Zagreb in Croatia. It was early to know if he had a future or not in the Barça first team, but the sports project dazzled him. He, and also his father, an essential figure to understand the solid football codes of this boy from Tarrasa.
Olmo ended up accepting Dinamo’s offer that promised to make him a benchmark player as they did in his day with Luka Modric. At just 16 years old he was already training with the first team. At 20, he was the best player in that league and a veteran with more than 100 games as a professional. Meanwhile he was proclaimed champion of Europe with the under 21 team, where he was declared the best player in the final.
His sudden rise to fame, leading Dinamo to their best European performance in decades, sparked the interest of Europe’s greats. Also from Barça, who made a new attempt to recover a fled youth squad. Olmo ended up at German Leipzig, where he continues to grow by leaps and bounds as a footballer.
A total playmaker
Against Portugal he displayed the bulk of his skills. It started on the left, with a changed leg, and causing Cancelo a severe headache. Fabulous at controlling the ball, Olmo stands out for his verticality and dribbling. The body frequently asks you to occupy the center of the three-quarter zone. And it is applied in defensive tasks, essential in a group where speculating is prohibited and the ball is carried only forward. In the Jose Alvalade he was in almost all of them. Although the shot failed him, he was the bravest in Spain when it came to shooting on goal. For being carried away, he even took the big bang of the night after a blow to the face of Rubén Semedo, that center-back famous for his controversies.
On Luis Enrique’s radar from the beginning, Olmo’s debut with the national team came after the last call-up of Robert Moreno, where qualification for Euro 2020 was achieved. He made his debut against Malta and only took three minutes to score his first international goal after replacing Morata. A kid with a star.
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