“Playing at the level I am playing, with 17 years, in Barça anyone does,” said the young man prior to the meeting with Inter.
Courtesy | He is focused on trying to help his team in his search for a title triplet
The dread that Lamine Yamal causes in the defenders when the ball receives on the right flank of Barcelona has inevitably evoked comparisons with the Lionel Messi of ruffled hair.
Now, the 17 -year -old star of Barcelona will face one of the few teams against which Messi could never score when Inter Milan visits Wednesday in the first leg of the semifinal of the Champions League.
Let us know that Yamal wants to have anything to do with that discussion of being version 2.0 of Messi. Nor does he believe that Inter had deciphered Messi, although he would certainly like to score against the Italian team and help Barcelona reach his first European final in a decade.
“I don’t compare myself with him, I don’t compare myself to anyone, much less with Messi. He is the best in the world,” Yamal said Tuesday at Barcelona’s training facilities during his first press conference with the club, in one of his most important weeks as a player.
“I leave that to you. We think of being better than oneself,” he added.
“That has not scored Inter? He has scored so many goals to so many teams that he must be the only one. Hopefully I mark,” Yamal said about the former Argentine Astro of Barcelona that once held him in his arms when he was a baby.
Lucing his new dyed blond hairstyle, the teenager who has possibly emerged as possibly the best young talent in world football said that nothing else was focused on trying to help his team in his search for a triplet of titles.
100 Barça games
Yamal is still more than two months before turning 18, but the match against Inter will be its number 100 match with the first Barcelona team.
“What I value most is always motivated and have the continuity I have,” he said. Playing at the level that I am playing, with 17 years, in Barça anyone does. ”
The semifinal of the Champions League is its most important match so far for Barcelona, along with the final of the Copa del Rey that Yamal helped Barcelona win against Real Madrid on Saturday.
Yamal contributed two assists in that exciting classic, the first for the initial goal of Pedri González and then for the goal of Ferran Torres that took the game on extra time, where Barcelona came out victorious 3-2.
-During that comeback, Yamal said he told a partner who didn’t matter how many goals Madrid scored, since “this year they can’t with us.”
Yamal will now bring that same confidence against one of Europe’s best defenses. Inter has maintained eight zero goals, leaders of this edition of the Champions League.
Barcelona boasts the best attack with 37 goals scored, compared to the 19 of Inter. Yamal has scored four of those goals and adds four assists.
“Everyone knows that in defense Inter is a very strong team and that this is their best weapon, and that the counterattack also plays very well,” Yamal warned.
The winner of the two-game series will face Paris Saint-Germain or Arsenal in Munich on May 31.
Age is just a number
Yamal surprised Barcelona last season when she broke records, including being the youngest scorer in the League, at 16.
His boom continued last summer when he became the youngest scorer in the history of the Eurocup, scoring the goal of the tournament in the semifinals against France before Spain won the final on England on his 17th birthday.
He has maintained his level this season for Barcelona. His 14 goals and 24 assists in all competitions also have Barcelona approaching the League title.
And just when it seemed that there were no more records to break, he became the youngest player to score in a classic.
Yamal is taking its rapid ascent calmly, dismissing the questions that everything could be too fast, at an age too young.
“For football there is no age, it goes on the quality of each one, of mentality too, but if you are prepared, you are prepared,” he said.
“You are not affecting anything, we are demonstrating it, we are a very young team, but age is just a number,” he closed.
