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No, Gerard Piqué and Jordi Alba are not Carles Puyol

Courage has led Xavi Hernández to leave two former teammates with whom he used to lift trophies on the bench. “They are in this situation, but they can change it because the season is long”, said the coach after the viral image of Gerard Piqué and Jordi Alba sitting in an unprecedented way against Valladolid. Serious faces, veteran looks, balances of ego and chewing that the end is getting closer while imposing, in Xavi’s words, “the meritocracy”. The inexorable law of time has turned them into luxury substitutes. A luxury that contributes decisively to the unsustainable weight of the wage bill and that conditions the movements to improve the team. They knew how to use the breast of the cowardly ex-president until there was nothing left and real resignations to endless delays are not part of the vocabulary.

Piqué’s case is important because he hasn’t played a single minute in the three matches played in the League. It shouldn’t surprise anyone after the conversation he had with Xavi on June 2. The coach already warned him that no matter how much he tried to be more professional, he would not be a starter because new additions would come. The tree needed new sap to get stronger and Piqué was no longer part of the plans. More than one in the club expected that the more rational side of the player would react and choose to go and forgive Calès. It wasn’t: he held on to the competitive gene that made him one of the world’s best centre-backs to fight for a place. At the same time, Alba endures the shame of seeing an 18-year-old dwarf taking the praise while waiting for what happens with Marcos Alonso. We’ll see how long the supposed good roll lasts.

Winning everything in terms of titles, but also in terms of money, is not the same as knowing how to say goodbye at the most appropriate time. Learning to leave a place you love and define you must be terribly complicated. Piqué had said several times that he would continue at Barça as long as he was important, not disappearing slowly on a bench. Theory and practice don’t always go hand in hand when feelings like self-love are in the middle. And, who knows, maybe life will prove him right again when everyone least expects it. Be that as it may, it is clear that the Carles Puyol route was not the easiest. The ex-captain, when he saw that the knee would never stop bothering him again, decided to terminate the contract and leave the two seasons (and the millions) he had left without effect. Puyol is from another pasta.

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