Rodri’s footballing IQ is not insignificant, so when FourFourTwo were in his company for an exclusive interview in Madrid, our tactics expert Adam Clery made sure to pick the best player in the world’s brains.
During a fascinating conversation, that will soon be available to watch on FourFourTwo’s YouTube channel, Rodri was asked where he saw football in a few years and made an interesting comparison to another sport we haven’t heard anyone else make before.
“I think it’s going to be very similar to handball," he said. "Do you know about handball? It’s something I speak a lot about with my friends.
'It's a mess'
“They stay all across their own area, just blocking. They don’t try to man-mark, they just stand there.
“In my opinion, it’s a mess, but we see now that when a team feels they’re maybe worse than the other, they are so defensive with almost 11 players in the box. It’s the new football.
“The team that’s defending play counter-attack, and the team trying to open them up are very spread out. That’s how I see football in the future.
“Even between two big teams, it used to be that the game was open, but now it doesn’t matter if the level of the two teams is similar. When they defend, they move back.”
He has seen his fair share of defensive blocks in his time, so is uniquely placed to make the parallel. What is true it is that there seems to be fewer end-to-end games in the Premier League now.
Rodri, ranked No.1 in FourFourTwo's Best Players in the World Right Now list, tends to agree and as a result, there’s a particular fixture he relishes.
“I enjoy most of the games we play against Liverpool. It’s great, because we think, ‘I don’t care, I want to punish you’ [in attack], and they have the same feeling. They’re not conservative, they go with the same mentality.”
In FourFourTwo's opinion, Rodri's thoughts about playing against Liverpool are intriguing, with other big teams like Arsenal sometimes employing slightly different tactics against Manchester City in recent times, particularly at the Etihad.
The Spaniard will be devastated not to be involved at Anfield on Sunday, don't expect it to be anything like a handball match.
