da bet sport： Barcelona officially offloaded Rafinha Alcantara on a one-year loan deal to Celta Vigo in the final hours of this summer’s transfer window. But looking at that deal as a whole, it feels like the Blaugrana made the wrong choice.
What’s the word, then?
da realsbet： The 26-year-old Brazilian has been a part of the Barcelona family for the majority of his footballing career. He started off in La Masia and rose through the ranks of the academy until he reached the senior team in 2013. But despite all of those years he spent in Catalonia, he never got an extended period of time in the starting XI.
His biggest problem has been injuries that have plagued him from the beginning of his career. Just last season, Rafinha was out for 217 days, which meant that he missed a total of 41 games. That practically ruled him out for the entirety of the season. And that wasn’t really the first time it happened, either.
Watch Spanish Football Live Streams With StreamFootball.tv Below
In 2016/17 he had a similar experience when a meniscal injury kept him out for 38 games. Needless to say, he was extremely unlucky in his career and that was always in the way of his success at Barcelona.
But with all of that being said, can Barcelona really afford to lose him now?
Lack of options
Rafinha’s transfer doesn’t seem that odd on the face of it. We’re talking about an injury-prone player that never truly impressed in the Blaugrana shirt. After all, he only scored 12 goals and assisted eight in a total of 90 games he played. And that’s the other thing, only 90 games to his name and he’s been at Barcelona for the vast majority of his career. By all accounts, that doesn’t seem so impressive.
But with no new signings arriving at the club on deadline day and with the departures of Philippe Coutinho and Malcom, Barcelona seem rather thin in the forward line. Sure, they have Lionel Messi, Luis Suarez, Antoine Griezmann and Ousmane Dembele but both Messi and Suarez are over 30 years old, Griezmann has just arrived at the club and Dembele is as injury-prone as Rafinha.
So looking at the attacking options the Catalans have at their disposal, they just might be missing a reliable substitute altogether. It would be difficult for the 26-year-old Brazilian to break into the team full of such stars but when he’s out there and when he’s fit, Rafinha is an excellent player. In the three games he played for Barcelona in the 2019/20 La Liga season, he averaged two shots per game, 1.7 key passes and 1.3 dribbles.
Not to mention that he can practically play all over the middle and the forward lines, which would give Ernesto Valverde a really versatile choice to plug many holes when necessary. Letting go of such a valuable player who can cover the area the team is currently thin at might not have been a brilliant move.
But only time will tell if this was the right call.
[ad_pod ]