Juan Roman Riquelme was not the most successful nor the greatest player of his generation. Far from it.
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There are many who have good reason to argue that his career was largely unfulfilled and the promise he first showed as a teen at Boca Juniors – suitably lumbered with the ‘New Maradona’ moniker – was never fully realised.
They would also point to his failure at Barcelona – albeit under mitigating circumstances – and his lack of trophies won outside of his two spells with Boca. But Riquelme’s modest trophy haul, certainly relative to his ability, in many ways outlines just what he was as a player.
For his retirement this week is as much about the ending of an idea as a time to pontificate over where he stands in the pantheon of the game.
Legends are measured by silverware and statistics: World Cups won, Ballon d’Ors, Champions Leagues and league titles lifted.
In Riquelme’s cabinet stands five Argentine league titles, three Copa Libertadores’ and Olympic gold. It’s notable his prizes as an individual – four-time South American Player of the Year – are more significant.
If anything, his career could also be remembered as much for the glorious failure: at Barcelona, of the missed penalty in the 2006 Champions League semi-final against Arsenal and the World Cup that year where he was the tournament’s best player in the group stage only to be substituted in the quarter-final as Argentina’s challenge flickered and died.
But this only adds to the romance of what Riquelme stood for.
He was unusual to look at. Box-like with wide shoulders and spindly legs, his appearance was not that of the finely-tuned athletes we’re so now accustomed to.
But that didn’t matter when he had the ball at his feet. Because Riquelme should not be defined for what he did or didn’t win but by how he played the game.
‘El Ultimo Diez’ (The Last 10), nobody could control the pace of a game like him. When Riquelme was in possession the ebb and flow of a match lived and died on his shoulders.
Winning was important, but the method, however maddening, was what mattered the most.
At Villarreal he was Yellow Submarine’s periscope, and few have had the same peripheral vision. He saw everything at a different speed. But contrary to how the game has developed, it was never at great velocity; Matrix-like in the way he could seemingly bend time.
Reading the many eulogies this week, what leaps out is the sort of prose used; Poetic attempts to try and get to the root of a deeply complex footballer.
But in the loud, over-hyped and largely conditioned world which football has become, perhaps that’s how he should best be remembered.
As someone who inspired people to think about the game differently.
