Thomas Muller, Mesut Ozil and the death of the Trequartista

Siddhant Lazar
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In a world of heavy pressing, high defensive lines, heavy metal football and consistent robotic performances, there's no longer space for a lackadaisical brilliant player. No longer place for a defensive passenger, no longer a place for a pure trequartista to simply put on his boots and dominate.

Football is a beautiful game and in so many ways. It’s arguably the one sport, there might be other contenders, that boasts nothing but beautiful sights. Oceans of fans flooding stadiums, chants running rings around the players, and then there are the men making it all worthwhile on that hallowed green rectangle. Real Betis and Quique' Setién’s tiki-taka engages, Liverpool’s heavy metal football excites, Peter Bosz and Daniel Farke’s kamikaze style of football gives you goosebumps. It’s brilliant, beautiful and makes every second worth watching and there will always be masters of the game.

Players, people, and even managers who make things worth watching, make it worth spending hours and hours glued so close to the screen that it cannot possibly be good for your eyes. And yet in the always-evolving landscape of modern football, players need to adapt or watch as they’re slowly fazed out of the team. They’ve made to watch as dynamic, action-packed midfielders, as forwards who like dropping back and even as inexperienced youngsters with more energy to press are all picked above them. It’s the ever-changing landscape of football and that may have just potentially caused the death of the Trequartista.

It is or rather was football’s most exciting position and not just because it invokes goosebumps. It’s the one position on the pitch that has fans fall in love all over again with football. It invokes dreams with one pass, one touch, one game-changing moment and gives children all over the world hope that one day they could be as cool as them. It’s why in hindsight the Michel Platinis, Francesco Tottis, Michael Laudrups, Zinedine Zidanes, and Denis Bergkamps are beloved around the world.

They paved the way for modern football and enhanced it from just a game to the greatest game ever played. Modern football may be starved of that position but the near past saw the likes of Mesut Ozil, Isco Alarcon, James Rodriguez, Thomas Muller, Christian Eriksen, Paulo Dybala and Juan Fernando Quintero epitomize the modern downfall of football’s greatest spot. Players who do not fit in the puzzle that is modern football’s desperate search for structure and efficiency. Instead, they thrive on being elusive, lackadaisical and love creating chaos.

But in a world dominated by the VAR, statistics, XG, and various other technological changes to help bring about efficiency, the exquisitely skilful number 10 has faded away. It’s really not their fault but the world has changed. No longer does excitement and unpredictability rank high in a manager’s playbook. They now want something they can control and few prove that more than Pep Guardiola, Unai Emery, Ernesto Valverde, Steve Bruce and even Zinedine Zidane. Results mean everything and in the age where managers are hired by the kilo and not given time to produce, who can really blame them??

While removing a creator isn't the way to get results, replacing him with three other players helps their cause. Formation switches from a standard 4-2-3-1, 4-3-1-2, 4-3-3 (with two holding midfielders) to a 4-3-3 or a 3-4-3 or even a 3-5-2 and all three formations have no space for passengers. Instead, they need players who are willing to contribute to every aspect of the game and then some, alongside the burden of doing their usual work. And that means that there is no longer a space for a passenger or an elusive playmaker-esque player and it’s caused a few problems to say the least.

"This type of player. This pure No 10, is … how do you say? Extinct? Maybe not extinct, but not as used as before."

Juan Mata to the Athletic

Thomas Muller, a modern legend, Mesut Ozil, another modern superstar, Paulo Dybala, the supposed heir to Argentina’s throne, and Isco Alarcon, another languid creator, have all been ousted. In their place, the dynamic and more all-action midfielders walk in who don’t just do everything as a midfielder but do possibly everything on the football field. It’s what modern football demanded and it’s exactly what the world gave birth too. The next few years, if not decades, will see them rise up and slowly take over the world, much like the VAR, and el creatore has now transformed into a holding midfielder.

The one position that’s been ever-present or nearly ever-present on every team have now transformed into quarterbacks. They almost always doing just that but now it’s become much more prominent. So prominent that man-marking one out of the game could potentially win it for you but yet the Jorginhos, Kroos, Alonsos and even Fernandinhos of the world have taken over everything. They’re backed with the rise of the marauding full-backs as creators in yet another shocking development but one welcomed by managers.

Manchester City infamously spent close to a £150 million on full-backs, Liverpool built their own pair from scratch, Barcelona’s Jordi Alba has run the left-hand side for many a year and Marcelo has won plaudits for his offensive dominance and rarely for his defensive. In fact Trent Alexander-Arnold and Andrew Robertson's stunning display of creativity last season has rather brilliantly taken the footballing world away from depending on just the one man. It signalled a change in the world but even then there are still traces of the old fashioned Trequartista. It’s faint but it’s there all across the world. 

It's there when Jordan Henderson threads an eye of the needle pass for a teammate, it's there when Roberto Firmino’s Samba style slips out and he cheekily plays through a teammate, it's there when Kevin De Bruyne, lackadaisical and arrogant, all at the same time, hits a pass that he knows will find a teammate, it's there when Lionel Messi does Lionel Messi things.  It's there when Paulo Dybala somehow dominates the spotlight instead of, Mr Spotlight himself, Cristiano Ronaldo and when River Plate fans had tears in their eyes as Juan Fernando Quintero was stretchered off the field. 

But it's there in the more conventional sense of the word as well, everpresent in those men smart and cunning enough to fool managers into believing that they're more than just pure flesh and blood born to do nothing but attack. Kevin De Bruyne, David Silva, Bernardo Silva, Ivan Rakitic, Frenkie De Jong and a myriad of other players do it well but not as number 10s or as Trequartistas. But instead as hybrid men placed deeper down and since they're so effortlessly brilliant they're more than capable of doing it from anywhere. 

It's why there are traces of that lazy, lackadaisical, effortlessly brilliant and incredibly intelligent player that once dominated world football but for how much longer before it's snuffed out by the all-action superstars?? The Trequartista may be a dying breed of superstars but as football moves through yet another phase in its life, they will return. Whether it will be just as entertaining, brilliant and just as good as it was before, we may never know. But things rarely are.

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