Barcelona is transparent and fragile.
He is looking forward to the season ending once and for all, the fight for second place in the League being a consolation that matters much more to those who manage the cobwebs of the box than to some footballers without titles to run for.
After the poor performance in the defeats against Cádiz and Rayo, the team beat a Mallorca that, after an hour locked up in their field, caused another unnecessary tremor in a Camp Nou that is restless.
Barça looked at its old guard, with Jordi Alba opening exits in the labyrinths and Sergio Busquets finishing off.
Although the one who changed the faltering dynamics of Barça was Memphis.
Yes, that striker who began the season with the energy and conviction to lead the post-Messi era, and who ended up forgotten in the dugout due to a responsibility that did not correspond to him.
The ownership of Memphis served to find new stimuli now that the winter signings languish.
Aubameyang has lost spark;
Ferran Torres, whom Xavi wanted to help by offering his edge, the right, continues to be martyred with the goal -when he scored, between rebounds, it was annulled for offside-; and Adama doesn't even appear anymore.
Memphis, who had rarely been seen claiming balls into space, knew how to interpret the needs of a Barcelona that, without the injured Pedri, lives on verticality.
And so the opening goal came.
Jordi Alba acted as a great shooter, and the Dutchman, who started at the right moment under Maffeo's vigilance, had only to control and execute with his right foot.
The goal in favor was the excuse that Piqué was waiting for to ask for the change.
The central defender insists on playing lame, and finds in Xavi an ally in that questionable exercise in heroism.
This time he lasted 28 minutes.
Neither did that Mallorca take advantage of the situation suffocated by the ghost of relegation and that Javier Aguirre insisted on throwing back, only hinting at a certain courage when he was already defeated.
Vasco, who didn't flinch when Busquets made it 2-0 with his left foot thanks to an advance from the balcony at the start of the second half, only took a step forward with a quarter of an hour to go.
Raíllo took advantage of a frontal free kick to close the gap.
Everything is there.
We are forced to be optimistic, although our nature drags us to pessimism.
What to do then? Try to be a "cheerful pessimist", which is the solution proposed by the novelist Julian Barnes when he is assailed by darkness?
Ansu Fati, a 19-year-old boy who has been sentenced to be a star, has spent a year and a half wondering if his already battered body will be able to give him a truce.
If the smile with which he faces each return from purgatory on the stretcher will be perennial, and not the mask that hides the trail of shed tears.
He played a quarter of an hour.
He must be patient in a sport that is not.
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soccer
FC Barcelona
Barcelona
Xavi Hernandez
Gerard Piqué
Ansu Fati