The Limited Times

Now you can see non-English news...

Lewandowski, much more than goals

2022-09-06T10:43:25.104Z


The Polish striker conveys a firm leadership at Barcelona and the rare feeling of superiority only available to true figures


The Lewandowski effect has been unleashed at Barça at the same time that the Lewandowski syndrome begins to affect Bayern, his former team, who have drawn the last two games.

The coach, Ralf Nagelsmann, does not stop answering a question that pisses him off.

"To what extent does Bayern suffer Lewandowski's absence?"

Xavi Hernández, on the other hand, was a happy man after the victory at the Sánchez Pizjuán, where Lewandowski scored a goal – his fifth in four games – and changed the sign of the match.

He intervened with hierarchy in the first goal and conveyed the rare feeling of superiority that is only available to true stars.

Less than a month has been enough for him to improve the general opinion, which already identified him as a relentless scorer.

Lewandowski was known to be an absolute guarantee in the area, a paragon of efficiency since he jumped from Lech Poznan to Borussia Dortmund and later to Bayern, whose successes in recent years have depended substantially on the production of the Polish player.

At the rate of one goal a game, he has terrified every defense in Europe.

Guarantor of the goal, Lewandowski appeared on the horizon of the market at the end of May.

He wanted to leave Bayern, a strange decision for a footballer who enjoyed a very comfortable situation.

He was the star of a club that won everything in Germany and he only feared three or four difficult games in the European Cup.

In objective terms, the European football market included a man who the previous season had scored 35 goals in 34 Bundesliga games and 50 in the 46 official games he played for Bayern.

Average: 1.04 goals per game, the best in Europe.

A production of this caliber arouses the appetite of any of the big clubs.

However, in the year of the center forwards —Haaland to Manchester City, Darwin Núñez to Liverpool, Vlahovic to Juve last January—, only one destination was speculated: Barça, a team traumatized by the crisis and an uncertain future .

Instead, Barça did not speculate on Lewandowski's age.

He paid 50 million for a 34-year-old player, whom he gave a four-year contract.

At a time of crisis and loss of international prestige, Barça bet on Lewandowski's long and prolific relationship with goalscoring.

If he maintained or slightly lowered his usual ratio, the signing exponentially improved the chances of the team, fought with goals since Messi's departure to PSG.

The signing also added another effect: a name known worldwide in a club that had lost the popular claim of its previous figures.

Lewandowski added commercial value to Barça.

More intriguing was what Lewandowski observed at Barça, in debt up to the eyebrows and a feeling closer to falling than to decline.

But the Pole accepted the challenge and surrendered to the multiple charms – levers in the new football jargon – that Laporta has deployed.

No other club sounded like an alternative destination, oddly enough.

The two parties became hell-bent on love at first sight.

If age invited doubts that his status as a stark scorer did not seek, Lewandowski's performance has exceeded all expectations.

Five games have been enough for him to transmit a firm leadership, without the theatrical excesses of which stars are known, and a fascinating amount of football resources, probably hidden under the brilliance of his figures in the shots.

For the past nine seasons, Bayern have been linked to the Pole's goals.

In four weeks, it is impossible to dissociate the current Barça optimist from a name: Lewandowski.

You can follow EL PAÍS Deportes on

Facebook

and

Twitter

, or sign up here to receive

our weekly newsletter

.

50% off

Subscribe to continue reading

read without limits

Keep reading

I'm already a subscriber

Source: elparis

All sports articles on 2022-09-06

You may like

Trends 24h

Latest

© Communities 2019 - Privacy

The information on this site is from external sources that are not under our control.
The inclusion of any links does not necessarily imply a recommendation or endorse the views expressed within them.