At the end of 1998, Real Madrid explored the possibilities of Christian Karembeu as a candidate for the Ballon d’Or. Then several emissaries from the club contacted journalists from France Football, the magazine that organized the vote, and claimed that the French center was the only footballer on the planet who had won the most prestigious titles: the World Cup and the Champions League. “We responded that titles were important,” one of those journalists recalled yesterday, “but that the other selection criterion, the one that weights individual performance, must consider above all the ability to create contexts. It was evident that in a football team Zidane created more contexts than Karembeu.”
Zinedine Zidane won the Ballon d’Or in 1998 and in his dazzling path he spread the seed of passion for football to millions of children. “My idol was Zidane,” repeats Rodri Hernández, who in 1998 was two years old and this Monday, at 28, took the Ballon d’Or in his hands. Not for scoring goals – which he scored, and they were truly decisive – but for leading his teams with mastery. The more intellectual dimension of individual performance, which determines the ability to organize and multiply the possibilities of the teammates around him, boosted Rodri’s game in tune with his French idol and under the supervision of Pep Guardiola, the man who, along with Luis Aragonés was able to develop Johan Cruyff’s most enduring lesson: the secret weapon of Spanish football lay in the unique associative capacity of its interiors.
“When a midfielder receives too much attention it is not a good sign,” said Guardiola, one day when he was asked if Rodri was an underrated player. “The spotlights must illuminate the nines and the tens. The midfielder must play for the team. He must make the team play. Rodri is the best midfielder in the world by far because he can do everything. He even scores goals!”
Practically fired from the Atlético youth team in 2014 and never well regarded in the Real Madrid youth team, which rejected his incorporation, Rodri tied up his duffel bag and looked for a life. He arrived in Manchester in 2019with a few scars on his self-esteem. He had played in the First Division with Villarreal and Atlético but was far from completing his training. His powerful physique, more than advantages, was a burden on the battery of activities that the position game requires. He was not a stripper like Busquets. Nor was he a marathon runner like Xavi. His size—he weighs more than 80 kilos—did not make it easy for him to profile or protect the ball under pressure, nor did it allow him to move to cover all areas of the field, as is the responsibility of a pivot who occupies the axis of the most dynamic 4-3-3. that exists. He should have accelerated his reading of the plays. He had to learn to think a lot before receiving the ball or the opponent receiving it. His tremendous competitive spirit pushed him to excel.
Substitute in 2021
Rodri will never forget that Guardiola left him on the bench in the 2021 Champions League final, played in Porto and lost to Chelsea after City came out to play without any midfielder other than Gündogan. That traumatic mark accelerated his evolution. In the following season he multiplied his conclusive decisions exponentially. Since February 2023, he has not lost a single match. Nobody in Europe directed the pressure on the man in the opposite field with more astuteness than Rodri, nor did he distribute the game with more resources, both in front of his centre-backs and between the lines, almost like a ten. He scored fabulous goals – against Bayern in the quarterfinals and against Inter in the Champions League final – but above all, he created contexts.
Heir to a football culture that produces the most imaginative interiors on the continent, he did like Luis Suárez, Cardeñosa, Martín Vázquez, the Bland Gallego, Juan Señor, Caminero, Xavi or Busquets. He asked for them all. He created the most perfect order that exists for attacking en masse. He was MVP of the last Club World Cup with City, he was Spain’s MVP at the Euro Cup summit, and he raised an award that recognizes a neglected school.
