Tales of the Faithful: The machine-accurate Xavi spent seventeen years at Barcelona

There are plenty of players who don’t warm to any football club and before you know it, they are wearing the colours of another outfit. Conversely, there are few who dedicate virtually their entire professional career to one club and become synonymous with club heartthrobs, even if they may not always be the club’s brightest stars.

Tales of the Loyalists is a series on Ruik that follows players who have dedicated all or the vast majority of their careers to one club. In today’s edition, we take a look at FC Barcelona midfielder Xavi Hernandez.

The start of his career

Xavi joined Barcelona’s famous La Masia academy at the age of eleven and has dreamed of making his debut in the Blaugranas’ A-team ever since. Already at a young age, his leadership skills were evident alongside his footballing ones, thanks to which he wore, in most youth categories, the captain’s armband.

He got his first taste of adult football in a Barcelona B jersey, where he played since 1997. But he lasted only two seasons there, and in the second he was already peeking into the first team led by Louis van Gaal.

Thanks to an injury to his role model and idol Pep Guardiola, he was given more playing minutes, which El maestro made the most of. He has convinced everyone of his talent, but that certainly doesn’t mean that he has had a bed of roses since then.

Xavi versus Guardiola

On the contrary. He has heard, and even received letters, about how he shouldn’t be cramming anywhere and shouldn’t take away “King Guardiola’s” position. Because originally, like Iniesta for example, he was taken as a defensive midfielder.

In this period of Van Gaal’s coaching, Xavi’s departure to Manchester United was imminent. It didn’t look like he was going to make it into the starting line-up in the short term, despite his higher elegance. But that was when it became clear how important parents can be in the lives of children. And also why they say that Mummy is always right.

Xavi’s father, Joaquim, saw the Red Devils’ offer, who had been tracking his son for a long time, as deliverance and a possible escape route for the young midfielder. But mum Maria was categorically opposed. And she didn’t stop at just non-specific opposition.

With a serious look on her husband and son’s face, she threatened to get a divorce if Xavi transferred. And so the transfer went through. Good thing she was so adamant. On the other hand, the idea of Xavi’s laser-accurate passes to Rooney, Van Nistelrooy or Cristiano Ronaldo doesn’t sound too bad.

Established in the first team

Since the turn of the millennium, Xavi has become a stable part of Barca’s first team, increasing the number of games he has played season after season, and his importance to the running of the team has grown with each passing year.

This has been largely due to Rijkaard’s foresight, which has seen the diminutive winger move up the line-up from position six to position eight. It was this that allowed Xavi to start alongside Guardiola, not instead of him, and the two Spaniards did not have to fight for minutes at the same position.

A few years later, Guardiola was already directing Barcelona’s play from behind the sideline in his role as coach and Xavi became one of the cornerstones of the golden era at the Camp Nou under vice-captain Carles Puyol.

Maquini’s qualities

Two things are clear evidence of Xavi’s excellence and precision. Firstly, his nickname in the booth, Maqi (short for Maquina, Catalan for machine), referring to his machine-like passing accuracy and ridiculously low number of loose balls.

The other goes to Real Madrid goalkeeping legend Iker Casillas, who has played many an age-old rivalry-steeped El Clásico against the little midfielder.

It was Casillas who, during that glorious Barca period, was repeatedly asked who he would drag from the Blaugranas team into the white colours to give Madrid a better chance of beating their rivals. Recall that at the time, Villa, Iniesta, Busquets or Messi were in Guardiola’s squad, but the former Spanish national team captain named Xavi time and time again as the key difference maker.

He amassed 767 competitive games in the claret and blue colours before moving to Qatar’s Al Sadd in the summer of 2015. With Barca in 17 years, he celebrated 8 league titles, 3 Spanish Cups and 4 Champions League championships among others.

Source: Transfermarkt