CESC, Bane or a Boon?
Cesc Fabregas
In the summer of 2011, when Barcelona finally completed the transfer of Fransesc ‘Cesc’ Fabregas, fans hailed it as the much-awaited return of the Catalan son. However, doubts were raised on how Fabregas would fit in the Barca line-up — considering Xavi’s and Andres Iniesta’s undisputable ownership of their respective positions.
But the intelligent and versatile player that Fabregas is, he transformed himself into more of a striker/second striker, to play, either alongside Lionel Messi or, in the absence/substitution of the Argentine, to be a direct replacement.
Fabregas’ transformation also gave rise to the ‘striker-less’ formation which Barca, sometimes, and Spain, throughout Euro 2012, have used. However, two years after his arrival, questions are now being asked on how effective Fabregas actually is up front. Not much, gauging by his performance in the second leg of the Champions League quarterfinals against PSG.
Barca’s lacklustre performance until Messi’s introduction was seen as another proof for the Catalans’ over-dependence on the little Argentine. Look it another way, it proved the ineffectiveness of Fabregas up front.
Of the 33 passes (stats from WhoScored.com) Fabregas completed, only three resulted in a direct shot on goal. This was despite the fact that Fabregas led the Barca attack alongside David Villa. Villa, on the other hand, managed four key passes that directly resulted in attempts on goal out of his 24 completed passes.
These numbers directly indicate that Fabregas more often than not tends to pass the ball horizontally than vertically. Hence, Barca often find themselves with a lot of possession but without many shots on target or penetrative threat.
The scenario changes completely when Messi takes over the duty. Of course, to expect Fabregas, or anyone for that matter, to be as good as Messi would be nothing but a fantasy. Fabregas is not able to solve Barca’s problems. To be fair to him, Fabregas surely has scored goals in that role, most prominent being his hat-trick against Mallorca in La Liga. But a team of Mallorca’s class will not be there in the business end of the Champions League where the competition is fiercer.
So do Barca really need Fabregas, at least in his current role? Jury is still out but it wouldn’t be so for long.
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