You won’t find a better footballer than Andrés Iniesta. Lionel Messi certainly has more goals, highlights, and individual awards, but you can’t really say that anyone is better than Iniesta.
Unfortunately, El Ilusionista will never win the Ballon d’Or, but Iniesta deserves to have won three or four. Ronaldinho, Cristiano Ronaldo, and Messi have kept Iniesta from winning the Ballon d’Or or FIFA World Player of the Year, and now Neymar will keep Iniesta from ever winning.
As a player, Iniesta has everything. His dribbling, passing, shooting, touch, and vision are world-class, and his work rate and ball-winning ability are that of an elite defensive midfielder. Iniesta is thought of as an attacking midfielder because he is a playmaker, but it is right to call Iniesta a center midfielder. Iniesta wears Number 8 for Barcelona and Number 6 for Spain, and these numbers are reflective of the vital central role he plays in those midfields, even if he is arguably the world’s best Number 10.
Don Andrés is universally recognized as a prodigy and grandmaster of a midfielder and footballer, but it’s important to remember that Iniesta played as big as Shaq in big games. The Barcelona and Spain midfielder is what’s known as a gamer in the United States, and without a doubt Iniesta has ice water flowing through his veins when the pressure is highest.
The Spanish midfielder has a knack for keeping possession of the ball when he is hounded by multiple defenders at once, and his ability to orchestrate the constant and quick passing of his teammates has even made some people describe Barcelona and Spain’s passing as boring because of its perfection. One characteristic of Iniesta’s game is the way that he always receives passes in just a way as to shake defenders or put himself in possession to make the next pass or go on a dribbling foray to help his team keep possession or attack.
It is Iniesta’s textbook fundamentals as an individual and team player that make him a grandmaster. When all the skills of the game are displayed with such ease and grace plus the ability to burn defenders or finish the opposition with a golazo then one can be said to be special indeed. Although Iniesta supplies so much running and defending, he isn’t really the unsung hardman doing the dirty work, rather he is the genius behind the team play of Barcelona and Spain.
Although Messi is capable of destroying opposing teams on his own, the argument has to be made that Iniesta (and Xavi) made Messi’s incredible scoring stats possible. Messi would have scored a ton of goals, but would he have had the ball at his feet in that key final third of the field as much if it weren’t for Iniesta?
Iniesta is only 31 years old and nowhere close to done. People forget that he’s still in his prime, and football fans everywhere hope that he plays for several more years to come.
With the 2015 Ballon d’Or about to be awarded to Messi, Iniesta deserved a special salute from this writer and World Soccer Source for his amazing play for Barcelona and Spain.