The difficult mission of replacing Lewandowski

Xavi Hernández has a real headache ahead of his team’s match this weekend against Espanyol at the Camp Nou. The Tarrasa coach faces the first of the three league games that he will have to play without Robert Lewandowski, a key player in the culé team and who has participated in more than half of Barça’s goals in the championship. Replacing the Polish striker is the first great challenge for the Catalans after the return from the World Cup.

Find a formula to not miss a goal at the beginning of the year. That is the task that most occupies Xavi right now. The Barca coach has found that the Sports Administrative Court (TAD) denied the injunction to the Pole after the expulsion he suffered against Osasuna and that he must improvise a 9 guarantee for the derby. It will not be an easy mission. Lewandowski’s numbers are staggering. He has scored 13 goals and has distributed four assists in just fourteen games, or what is the same, he has participated in 17 of the 33 goals that his team has scored, 51.5%. These figures have allowed him to become the axis on which the entire attack front of the new culé project pivots. He is the goal and when he is on the field the alternatives multiply.

For this reason, Xavi will have to rebuild the attack front so as not to lose bite in the next three games. Lewandowski will not be against Espanyol, Atlético de Madrid and Betis and the alternatives that Barça manages include converting a winger or relying on strikers who have not been so common up to now. The most viable option according to what has been seen this course is to relocate Ferran Torres or Ansu Fati. The former City player has already played this role this season as a false nine and it is an option that would allow a player with a lot of mobility to create spaces. The other option would allow the style not to change, keep one more forward of reference and bring on Memphis Depay, already fully recovered from the physical problems he had before the World Cup, or even opt for a subsidiary player like Víctor Barberá.