Read this article and learn something for once in your life:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/football/blog/2009/aug/12/david-villa-valencia-worlds-best-striker
After all of the to-ing and fro-ing, rumours, counter-rumours and deals reported to be done, David Villa looks to be staying put. Remarkable as it seems, one of the most talked about commodities in the summer transfer market is expected to line up for Valencia against Sevilla when La Liga begins at the end of August, rather than Real Madrid, Barcelona or, indeed, in the Premier League.
The rumours may rumble on with Manchester City, Liverpool and Manchester United all supposedly still looking to sign the striker yet Villa himself has confirmed he will not be appearing in the Premier League. English clubs always suspected that he had no intention of joining them in any case.
Chelsea's representative, Juan Cruz Sol, emerged from Mestalla earlier this summer and threw in the towel, insisting: "Villa wants to go to Madrid." Negotiations between Madrid and Valencia ultimately broke down over money with the Valencia president, Manuel Llorente, insisting that Villa was not for sale unless someone makes a "scandalously scandalous" offer but that should not offer renewed hope for the Premier League.
There is nothing to indicate that missing out on moves to Madrid and Barcelona will change Villa's mind. "I have made a decision," he has said, "and that decision is that I will play in Spain next year. I am not going abroad."
For the Premier League, it is a huge pity. Make no mistake, Villa is one of the best strikers in the world. Possibly the best – and he will be looking to prove it when Spain play Macedonia tonight.
Asked whom he preferred out of Kaká and Ronaldo, the Spain coach, Vicente del Bosque, replied: "Villa." Of course he would say that, but he had a point. The most extraordinary thing about the transfer battles involving Villa this summer is not that Valencia wanted more than €40m (£35m) for Villa after Madrid had spent €94m on Ronaldo but Madrid were not prepared to pay it. But then, the club's director general, Jorge Valdano, said: "There are players who generate money and players who only have a footballing value."
Villa is a miner's son whose father was involved in two serious accidents in his home town of Tuilla in the principality of Asturias, famous for the 1934 revolution. His grandmother was called Libertad (Liberty) and her father was nicknamed Trotsky. But he is not mediático. "There are players who have done half of what he has done and been treated like stars," says one of his former colleagues privately. The "unlike Villa" goes without saying. "But," he adds, "in the end, David's stats are incontrovertible."
That is true. But the stats have always been hugely impressive and it has taken a remarkably long time and, fundamentally, a European Championship success with Spain – for Villa to be recognised. It is striking that this is the first summer that there has been a real auction for him.
Although Real Oviedo turned him down for being too small as a kid and Pepe Acebal, who gave him his debut at then Second Division Sporting Gijón, recalls that he initially lacked the stamina to have a real impact and had to be given his chance bit by bit, Villa's capacity for work was "unrivalled". A local derby stands out in which, as a 19-year-old, he tore Real Oviedo apart. He scored 18 league goals in his first season for Sporting, 20 in 2002-03.
At Zaragoza, in his first season in the top flight, he was named the revelation of 2003-04. He got 39 in two years and has not stopped since. He became Valencia's best ever debutant with 25 in his first season. And last season he equalled the club record, held by Mario Kempes, with 28.
With Spain, for whom a call-up was long overdue, he was top scorer at Euro 2008, despite missing the final and most of the semi-final. He got three at the 2006 World Cup, even though Luis Aragonés inexplicably withdrew him before the hour mark in all three of his starts. And as Villa himself says: "I make an effort to be ready, fit and alert in the last 15 minutes – that is when most goals are scored."
This season, undisputed at last for Spain, he has scored 13 in 12 internationals, reaching 31 in 48 caps. He is just 13 behind the country's all-time top scorer Raúl. And he has played over 50 games fewer.
When he missed a penalty against South Africa in the Confederations Cup, it served only to confirm that he is fallible. The sensation did not last long: 23 seconds later, he made amends with a brilliant goal. It came from a familiar source: out of nothing. The mind was cast back to Valencia's trip to San Siro: one Internazionale defender complained that Villa had "made us look like idiots, all on his own".
The key to his game is movement, says Acebal – desmarques de rotura, the ability suddenly to shake off defenders, made him stand out. Just ask England's centre-backs who never seemed able to fathom where he was in Seville earlier this year. "He had great technical qualities. His first touch was superb and, although you can never be sure someone will make it, you could tell he was talented. He makes very clever diagonal runs, breaking away from defenders," Acebal says. "And he invariably made the right decisions. He is very intuitive."
Then there is the coolness, the precision in front of goal. "He's very ambitious but extremely calm," adds Valencia's assistant coach Juan Carlos Carcedo. "He is never nervous; he exudes confidence."
According to his international team-mate Xabi Alonso, Villa "is a born goalscorer: quick, clever and strong, superb with both feet". The ambidexterity is a product of a broken femur when he was a young boy: with his leg in plaster, Villa was thrown the ball by his dad over and over and he kicked it back with his unplastered (weaker) leg. He is, Alonso continues, "a striker who barely needs a second to release a shot". Even if it is on the halfway line: his best came against Deportivo de La Coruña, when he hit a 50 yarder … on the turn.
He has scored free-kicks, headers, volleys, chips and screechers. There is a certain obsessiveness about him. "I can't remember every goal," he says, "but if I sat down with a pen and a piece of paper, I'm sure I'd remember most of them." There are a hell of a lot to remember. There are 168 league goals, despite not playing for one of the country's very best sides. Valencia have finished fifth, 10th, fourth and third in the seasons Villa has spent there; Zaragoza were 12th twice. Over the last five years, only Samuel Eto'o has scored more goals than him. And Eto'o only has six more – in a team that racked up 129 more than Villa's sides. Then there's the fact that for most of that time he has taken Valencia's corners and free-kicks – and however good a player is he can't head in his own crosses.
And that's the thing: it is not just about the goals. Villa is an exceptional footballer – "a phenomenon, the best in Europe", says the five-times Pichichi winner Quini – who has played as a centre-forward, on the left of a front three, behind the striker or in a typical 4-4-2. And he has succeeded in all of them. He has helped his team succeed in them all.
"I like him best between the two centre-backs because that gives him the greatest options when it comes to making runs but it doesn't matter to him. For a striker he is remarkably lacking in ego," says Acebal. "If he sees a one-two, he'll take it rather than shoot. He is very intelligent." Carcedo agrees: "Strikers are defined by the goals they score but
Villa has a wider repertoire. He drops to the wing, opens the game out for others, is quick and incisive and has an eye for a pass."
It is no exaggeration. In his first season at Valencia, he provided more assists than anyone except Pablo Aimar; in 2006-07 he gave more assists than anyone in the whole of La Liga. He is not just a striker, he is an attacker – "the complete attacker", according to Michael Robinson, the former Liverpool player and now Spain's most significant television pundit. "Villa," he says, "has absolutely everything." Except, as yet, the cheerleaders his abilities deserve.
