Surrealism tends to attract, like everything that escapes reason and is close to madness. Also in football.

Luuk de Jong

bewilders and provokes. It's Dalí with the ball. He is such an absurd striker that it is hard not to take his eye off him. Either because his manners, rusty and rough, invite the most cruel mockery. Or because that stone gesture, where you can only see emptiness and expressionlessness, also opens the door to unexpected outcomes. Luuk, the same one who woke up throwing a grotesque ball that came out of the touchline, also the same one who drew such an aesthetic Chilean that not even the noise of the crossbar detracted from mysticism, raised his body again. And with his head he gave the minimized Barcelona a triumph that the criticized

Ter Stegen

had to save in the end

.

One learned to mark.

Another remembered to stop.

What better hero than the misunderstood.

The Barça team came to Son Moix loaded with casualties (up to 16) and with their coach, Xavi Hernández, much better in solving problems than in complaining.

As he had no full-backs, he played with four center-backs.

Mingueza, on the right;

Araujo, a unique firefighter, on the left.

As there was no midfielder to organize and no matter how much Frenkie de Jong was at the pivot, few like Eric García to create and divide.

With no wingers from the first team to pull from, Ilias and the brave Jutglà occupied the shores.

While Luuk de Jong would be the one who would act as the final point, with the hyperactive Riqui Puig hovering around his back.

The game gave for bizarre situations, such as seeing Piqué rehearsing a direct free kick, although with little skill, or Araujo trying to advance as if he were an old-school lane.

However, Luis García Plaza's Mallorca, at least in the first act, barely responded.

Nor did the absence of the injured Take Kubo help, who could well have lent a hand to a Kang-inLee condemned to an insipid monologue at the front, nor did the team's streak (and a victory in 11 games) herald any football rebellion.

So Barcelona was able to live relatively in peace.

He denied Mallorca's counter-attack attempts thanks to the fact that both Eric García and Piqué pushed their midfielders upwards, and in attack the plan was to find the Luuk stem at all costs.

Jutglà, who came from screwing a ball that narrowly went out, was the one who managed to leave Luuk de Jong alone in front of Manolo Reina. His filtered pass with the left boot deserved an award to which the Barcelona striker could not correspond. The Dutch striker stretched his leg as far as he could, but the touch had enough deficiencies that the ball ended up on the post, not on the net.

A minute later Luuk sought redemption with his impressive Chilean to the center of Mingueza, who gave him to center all the ball before the impossibility of finding other types of solutions.

The insistence of the Barça side, whom Riqui looked for from the balcony of the area, ended up having a prize.

Luuk de Jong jumped more than Maffeo, more than Russo, even more than Ronald Araujo, who had also gone to the auction.

The header served for Barcelona to catch just before the break a goal with which to cheat until the end.

Because Barcelona, ​​increasingly exhausted, increasingly unrecognizable and increasingly laden with children (midfielder Álvaro Sanz, 20, and winger Estanis Pedrola, 18, debuted in the second half) could not help but to survive .

Luis García encouraged his players to charge with all their strength in the last stretch of the duel, already with Fer Niño, Mboula and even Prats in search of a tie.

Perhaps this Barcelona of Xavi could not be asked to defend with the ball and in the rival field.

He had enough to trust the wall erected by Piqué YEric García, or to move the locals away from the domains of a Ter Stegen who was only disturbed by Mboula five minutes from the end.

The ball went too high.

Glory awaited the German goal in the addition, when he took out his arm, made of granite, to deny the draw to Jaume Costa.

If Barcelona has recovered its goalkeeper, it has recovered half a life.

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