The key will be in the central

The possibility of having five changes at hand when the competition resumes could rethink changes in strategy in the coaches, who at least until now had not even considered. One of the options would be to use the resource of changing a central defender, something that is traditionally anecdotal in football: It is only considered in case of injury or an ultra-conservative or desperate strategy, depending on whether to introduce one more central defender or change it for a striker, respectively.

An internal study by FC Barcelona corroborates the possibility that it will be a central defender who enters the rotations in the changes from now on. The report details that the central defenders are the players who arrive most exhausted at the end of the games and that they are more exposed to making mistakes in the last minutes due to this deficit of forces.

A total of 23 players were evaluated in the analyzes throughout the season in order to draw these conclusions. The first is that there are no significant differences between the first and the second half in most soccer players. Only in the central defenders is a gradual and inexorable descent seen in the last minutes, both in the first and in the second part, although it is much more accentuated in the latter. Up to 13.5%, in some cases, metabolic decrease when covering distances.

This fact corroborates the option that one of the changes that Setien may consider in order to exhaust the five that he will have in his hands is the option of entering a refreshment center in the last minutes. Ahead of the premiere in the match against Mallorca at Son Moix, he will already have an important first handicap: he will not have the French Clément Lenglet, as he is sanctioned, so the only options he will have in the central axis will be Gerard Piqué and Samuel Umtiti, the latter with the added problem that he has been on leave for three weeks due to a soleus injury -this Thursday Ciutat Esportiva came to do treatment despite having spent three days training with the group-.

In principle, on the Son Moix bench, It will have the central of the subsidiary, the Uruguayan Ronald Araujo, who since he returned from confinement has been in the dynamics of the first team, as could also be Chumi and Cuenca, both have already participated these days with the Setién team. It must be remembered that the Federation expands the quota of players in a call up to a total of 23, so the number of players that may be on the bench will also increase, which until now was only seven.