Sergio Busquets: Barcelona's best supporting actor sets the stage
Spain's World Cup-winning midfielder is proud to cover his illustrious team-mates' backs
Most people don't like Sergio Busquets. But then his club and country coaches, Pep Guardiola and Vicente del Bosque, are not most people. Nor are his Barcelona team-mates. In the bowels of the Camp Nou, the question is obvious. "You must be happy to be free to play in this Champions League final after everything that has happened?" Busquets is asked. "Sí, muy contento," says the Spaniard sharply. And then there is silence and a steely stare. Next.
Busquets does not want to talk about theatrics or racism, about Real Madrid's complaint. He doesn't want to talk about the Uefa investigation that threatened to keep him out of the final but ultimately found that there was not sufficient evidence that he had called the Brazilian full-back Marcelo "mono", a monkey. He does not want to talk about the recriminations and the accusations.
For now, Busquets is just happy to be able to play. And he is not alone: Barcelona's handling of the case might have been different had there not been a European Cup final at stake. One of the few things that has not been said about Busquets over the past few weeks is the one that, come Saturday night, will be the most important: he is a very good footballer. An absolutely vital one.
If many dislike Busquets, those who work with the midfielder are not among them. They admire him. More importantly, they appreciate him. Del Bosque and Guardiola have long defended him and promoted him even when there were doubts not just about his personality but about his play. They saw something in him that many others did not. Even now, he is probably the least lauded of Barça's team. Until, that is, you ask his fellow players.
As the midfielder himself puts it: "People who don't like football don't appreciate my game, but I like it. My team-mates appreciate that I do the dirty work and I know it is necessary." Necessary is not the half of it.
Busquets, son of the former Dream Team goalkeeper and current coach Carlos, started the 2008-09 season playing at Santa Eulalia with Barcelona's B team. He ended it in Rome, lifting the European Cup – the third trophy of a unique treble for a Spanish club. The following summer he was in the Spain team that travelled to South Africa. At the start of the competition, most still saw little need for Busquets in the side, certainly not alongside Xabi Alonso. Del Bosque, though, did – and by the end Busquets was a world champion. That might not have been sufficient to win him fans but it did sweep away the doubts.
"If I could be any player in the world, I would like to be Sergio Busquets," Del Bosque had said at the start of the tournament. "He does everything; he always helps the team, he is generous, and he is the first to get the team moving. When he plays, the football is more fluid. With Busquets in the team, our football is better."
Xavi Hernández describes him as "fundamental". He says: "Busi sees you quickly, he always takes the simple option. He reads the game well and moves the ball with precision, in as few touches a possible."
Johan Cruyff says: "He is a gift for any coach. The speed of his passing is perfect and he is the kind of player you don't need to explain anything to. You just put him in his position and he performs."
As endorsements go, they don't come any higher. Cruyff is the guru of the current Barça approach – the coach who did with Guardiola what Guardiola has done with Busquets, fast-tracking him into the side unexpectedly.
When Guardiola said that he believed in Busquets recently, he was talking about the accusations. But he could have been talking about his contribution on the pitch. If some were unconvinced at first, it was in part because Busquets appeared to take risks and invite danger. Although his game was largely about releasing the ball quickly, occasionally he dwelled and waited. But Guardiola's faith was well-placed. By the end of his first season it was clear that these were really not risks – they just looked that way from outside. Up in the stands, hearts beat faster than his ever did.
In part Busquets invites trouble on to himself so as not to invite it on to others. "If there's a problem, I prefer to have to swallow that myself than force a team-mate to do so," he says. "I think about them because in my position that is what your job consists of. In teams that are as offensive as Barcelona and the Spanish national team, the central midfielder is fundamental to maintain balance."
It is no idle claim: statistics show, for example, that Dani Alves, nominally Barcelona's full-back, spends more time in the opposition half than his own. "The coach knows that I am an obedient player who likes to help out and if I have to run to the wing to cover someone's position, great," he says. "I genuinely enjoy watching the full-back run up the pitch and going across to fill in. I spend the game calculating: how many on the left? How many on the right?"
"He thinks more about the team than himself," Guardiola says. In a team with David Villa, Andrés Iniesta, Pedro, Xavi, and Leo Messi that means Busquets gets noticed less. It is a good job he enjoys the hard work because the glamour roles are left to others. He has had only 13 shots in all competitions this season. Of his one goal, he jokes: "I made a mistake once."
At Barcelona that role is vital, the central cog. He might look out of place, but if there is one thing you can rarely say about Busquets it is that he is out of place. Busquets protects and serves. In La Liga, only Xavi has completed more passes per match; in the Champions League only Gerard Piqué has regained possession more. The centre-back likens Busquets to a snowplough, sweeping all before him. Busquets says: "I would rather cut out 10 passes and win the ball back than play a load of one-twos."
In a team of Lilliputians, he provides the mala leche – the bad milk, the nastiness that others don't have. He winds up opponents: accusations of gamesmanship abound, from England particularly, against a player who has drawn more fouls this season than even Messi. If Barcelona like to present themselves as the good guys, Busquets is the bad guy. Now more than ever before. And that's the way they like him.
