On Sunday evening, Pierre-Emerick Aubameyang was not just part of something special, Barcelona’s 90-minute message that they are being rebuilt under Xavi; he was the leader of it. The instructive moment came between his two finishes, excellent as they were, a glorious backheeled pass for Ferran Torres that wasn’t far removed from the great Guti assist that forms part of every great La Liga compilation video.
Two seconds that encompassed everything that makes a great attacker: the mind (selflessness), the eyes (vision to spot Torres’ run), technique (the execution of a difficult skill). And then the joy, a communal celebration of comfortable victory against historic rivals but also something a little more individual.
“You said I couldn’t do this anymore; I can do it and more,” he almost seemed to be saying.
Which all comes as something of a shock to those of us who watched Aubameyang’s gloomy image haunting Arsenal’s final third, a kind of footballing spectre who realises that the ball will simply pass through him every time he tries to make a difference. When it first stopped working, we wondered what was up. Eventually we wondered if he could ever be up again.
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Late-stage Arsenal Aubameyang was an insipid experience for supporters who saw him as the personification of their club’s ills: a new contract and then immediate depreciation, an ageing player being mistakenly overpaid, a senior player without an obvious role and another club captain stripped of that privilege.
But that disappointment extended beyond club loyalty, because there’s not much worse than watching a player struggle under the weight of their own decline. For his first three seasons at Arsenal, Aubameyang was special, a smiling assassin who became the standard bearer for post-Wenger promise. And then…nothing; barely half a grin. An even worse accusation festered: difference-maker had become trouble-maker.
This is all something of the happy accident; so often the best sporting narratives owe much to good timing and good fortune. Barcelona were not planning to sign Aubameyang in January, because Alvaro Morata was the reported first choice. Xavi had previously expressed that Aubameyang was not a Barcelona-type forward.
Fast forward six weeks and Xavi was describing him as a “gift from heaven”, and that was before Sunday’s El Clasico. “He is a positive player, he has come into the dressing room very well, he adapts well to the team, he creates scoring chances, he scores, he presses, he is a privilege to train,” is Xavi’s assessment. Arsenal supporters may wince a little at the description, given how it ended in north London.
It should be noted that Arsenal have not suffered. This is a rare move where all parties – former club, new club, player, agent (presumably) – are delighted by the outcome. Arsenal were able to shift their highest-paid player off the wage bill. Mikel Arteta could build his attack around young players. There was no elephant on the substitutes’ bench and any sense that Aubameyang had become a destabilising influence was removed before the relationship had soured to the point that it became destructive. And Aubameyang is smiling again.
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The change in circumstances has certainly helped. Under Xavi, Barcelona are increasingly playing on the counter attack (the coach insisted that this was part of the club’s old DNA when questioned about the shift in attacking strategy). In Ferran Torres, Ousmane Dembele and Adama Traore he has quick attackers who both look to provide service from wide and get close to Aubameyang when the situation suits. He is playing through the middle again, which wasn’t always the case at Arsenal under Arteta.
But that question – is it him or them – misses the point: it is always a marriage, a shifting balance between the two that act in combination to either stimulate or hamper. Aubameyang did not suddenly become unable to perform – that is extremely rare at 31 without serious injury. He did not suddenly decide to down tools. Instead he became subject to a damaging cycle in which his circumstances affected his performance and his performances made the circumstances more difficult.
There is no such thing as a bad player and it is very rare that a player does not try (you do not spend the first quarter of your life becoming addicted to scoring goals and winning matches and then suddenly lose that edge). Every professional player is capable of brilliance; what defines their success and failure is the ability to do it consistently when it matters.
In turn, that ability is defined by confidence, happiness and self-fulfilment (the theory that what has just come before shapes what will happen next). Aubameyang is merely the latest example in a long line of players who looked like they had no future but actually were simply living in the wrong home.
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