Koundé against the evil eye

Jules Koundé has been the last center-back to incorporate Barcelona into his team. A signing that became official yesterday afternoon after the Barça club reached an agreement with Sevilla for 50 million euros plus another ten in different variables. According to sources from the Catalan club, consulted by ABC, half of these variables (5 million) would be easy to comply with while the other half would be subject to more complex successes by Xavi Hernández’s team. Koundé will be presented on Monday and will sign for five years. In this way he reinforces Barça’s defense after incorporating Christensen, who arrived with the letter of freedom after finishing his contract with Chelsea. One of Xavi’s obsessions is to shore up a defensive line that is usually the Achilles’ heel in the style of play he likes at the Camp Nou, a slave to the system inherited from the Dutch school of Cruyff and later implemented by Rijkaard, Guardiola and Luis Enrique . Pedro Nieto, former soccer player and commentator in LaLiga, explains the reasons why it is so difficult for him to succeed as a central defender in Barcelona. «It is due, above all, to the game proposal that Barcelona has. He likes to have possession and when he has the ball the defenders suffer less. The central defenders of Barcelona usually do well when they get the ball out, but they are not strong when it comes to scoring. They have not grown in marking but in getting the ball out. And when the opposing team has the ball and you don’t recover quickly after a loss, it gets you in trouble », he analyzes. And he offers another key element: “It’s not that they don’t have conditions, but Barcelona, ​​like Madrid, demands much more from you and the pressure can overcome you.” The difficulty in adapting to the intended DNA is exemplified by the failure of great central defenders who have not been able to adapt with the Barça shirt despite their proven quality. Since Carles Puyol made his debut with the first team in the 1999-00 season, no coach has been able to find a youth academy player at La Masía who would settle in the first team and those who have, like Piqué or Eric García, have had to go through other teams to form. Of the 19 footballers from the lower categories who have had an opportunity with the first team so far this century, only Oleguer, Bartra or Mingueza enjoyed some continuity. The rest (Dani Tortolero, Rodri, Olmo, Marc Valiente, Martos, Fali, Botía, Muniesa, Fontás, Sergi Gómez, Edgar Ié, Borja López, David Costas, Chumi and Cuenca) passed through the Camp Nou unnoticed. This impossibility of finding plants at home forced the technical secretariat to search the market. 24 centre-backs have signed Barcelona since 2000, investing more than 425 million euros, with more errors than successes. Cold statistics are often the yardstick by which success and failure are measured. Piqué (14 seasons, 606 games and a cost of 5 million) and Rafa Márquez (7 years at the club, 242 games and a transfer of 5.25 million) are the great successes. The great fiasco is provided by Pep Guardiola after investing 25 million in Chigrinsky, a Ukrainian who played for Shakhtar Donetsk and who barely played 14 games in the only year he was at Barcelona. He is joined by footballers who went to look for him in the winter market such as Yerry Mina (14.4 million for six games in one year), or Murillo (1.2 million invested to play four games). And future bets that were severe failures and that in some cases did not even make their debut, like Henrique, signed by Txiki Begiristain and who did not even make it through the preseason under Pep Guardiola, despite the fact that 8 million were paid to Palmeiras. Rijkaard paid half a million to Valladolid for the transfer of Mario Álvarez, who only played two games; Luis Enrique trusted the potential of Marlon (5 million, one game), and Valverde, in Todibo (one million and five games in two seasons). Related News standard No Atlético de Madrid Nahuel Molina, from not playing in Boca to shining in Calcio Iván Martín standard No Football Ancelotti’s four doubts in the new Real Madrid Emilio V. Escudero Not all have been such striking disappointments. Some centrals have not triumphed although they have had an acceptable career with the Barça shirt. Mathieu, Lenglet or Umtiti (until his battered knee said enough) are a clear example. Valencia charged 20 million for Mathieu (91 games in three years), Sevilla 35.9 for Lenglet (160 games in four seasons, although criticism in the last two years has led him to seek an exit in the form of a loan to Tottenham ) and Lyon 25 for Umtiti (133 games in six years. His performance plummeted after winning the World Cup in 2018, but he was previously considered one of the best central defenders Barcelona had signed). Injuries, precisely, have conditioned the performance of some defenders who aimed high. Gaby Milito (20 million and 76 games in four years) and Thomas Vermaelen (19 million and only 53 games in four years) can attest to this. The two most curious cases were carried out by Javier Mascherano, a midfielder who triumphed when Guardiola converted him into a central defender (24 million and 333 games in 8 seasons), and Alex Song, whom Tito Vilanova signed after Arsene Wenger assured him that he would give a very good central performance when the Arsenal manager had only made him play in midfield. The failure was sung (19 million and only 65 games in two seasons). The list of central defenders in the last 22 years is completed by Christanval (17 million), Patrik Andersson (8), Thuram (5), Cáceres (16.5), Araujo (4.7) and Eric García (he arrived with the letter from freedom from City).