Lamine Yamal did not need to score any of Barça’s five goals to make the difference in Tuesday’s match at Son Moix. The winger caused the penalty that made it 1-2, assisted Raphinha with the outside of his left foot to make it 1-3, repeated the hit for Pau Víctor that made it 1-4 for De Jong and started the action to make it 1-5 finished off by Pau Víctor. Although his repertoire was so extensive that he even missed two chances, the event was marked by the touch of the ball in the action of Barcelona’s third goal. A play already seen against Villarreal and then against Espanyol and that is on its way to being patented with the permission of Salah, Vinicius, Palmer and Modric for not evoking Cruyff. Football takes on a particular dimension with Lamine.
“There have been times when we have demanded of him, he has had to run backwards and we defended him well,” argued Arrasate, the Mallorca coach. “The problem has come when the spaces have appeared,” he continued. “Lamine has interpreted the game very well, when to accelerate and when to stop and, above all, the moment to put the ball; “It has different contact surfaces to do it.” The coach had already expressed his surprise the day before at “the forward’s impact on the game” when he is only 17 years old. “Barcelona attacks with more order, has more offensive solutions and is better prepared for recovery with Lamine,” Arrasate concluded. Flick was more concise: “We need him,” stated the Barça coach.
The 16 games that the Barça team has won have been with Lamine as a starter if the League (12) and the Champions League are included. He did not play the day Barça drew in Vigo, he was not in the defeat against Real Sociedad and his participation was very limited in the lost matches against Osasuna (31 minutes) and Las Palmas (45). The exception was against Monaco when they started and the score was 2-1. An injury to the syndesmosis in his right ankle suffered in Belgrade kept him out of action for three weeks and caused Barça to spend a “shit” month of November—Flick’s word—. He was only not missed with Brest. Lamine, who has already scored six goals, influences the match, the game and his team and conditions the opponent’s in the League and in Europe.
The statistic also ensures that he has 10 assists, eight in the League, one more than Salah (Liverpool) and two less than Saka (Arsenal) if compared with the records of the five best European championships. There is also no better dribbler in the League: he has 40 dribbles, compared to 38 for Vinicius and 36 for Lukebakio. Lamine got rid of his fear on the street, when he avoided dogs with a plastic ball and faced older boys, and was educated at La Masia, “the place where they know the most about everything: having control of oneself, knowing when “You have to play slowly or when you need to be fast, play as a team,” Lamine himself has confessed. Although his statement brings him closer to Messi, his reference is Neymar, especially because of the “trivela”, the hit with the outside of the foot seen in Mallorca.
Lamine acts as the soloist of the jazz band that improvises from the music theory learned in Barça’s youth football. He acts when he plays, as if he were regulating his effort, very patient in a fast-paced team like Flick’s. The coach was already angry with the player for arriving late for a talk and it is known from the mouth of his friend Nico Williams that he fell asleep on the bus on the way to the Euro Cup semi-final. The sleepy Lamine always wakes up in time for others to fall asleep after victories like those against France and in Mallorca.
