For a considerable time, Spanish football was the nucleus of a universe dominated by a group of very special players, against the prevailing fashions, definitely countercultural, heterodox in what they preached on the field and in the perception they communicated around them. Small, light and cunning – or tall, clumsy and shrewd in the case of Busquets –, they seemed predestined for a pleasant, but smaller role, at a time defined by the speculative model that had been established by Italy and Greece, the last two world and European champions. Against that generalized idea, an unexpected group of players rebelled, stubborn to go against the clichés and ready to dominate football. David Silva was one of them. And his retirement is imminent, brought down by a torn ligament in his knee.
Wherever he has been, it is impossible to discuss the Silva effect and the gigantic mark he has left on Valencia, Manchester City, Real Sociedad and the Spanish national team. At every stage of his professional career, David Silva’s contribution to his teams has been gigantic. He improved on all of them, won titles with all of them and won general admiration in all of them. And more than in any other guild, among their fellow professionals.
Like Xavi, Iniesta or Cazorla, main representatives of the generation that ruled football at the turn of the first and second decades of this century, David Silva invited misunderstanding. That is, to the art of denying appearance, confusing the staff and emerging victorious from the challenge. With a height of 1.70, Silva appeared quietly, the typical short footballer, equipped with skills that made him stand out among the Spanish youth, but which did not invite to think about a resounding jump to the professional peak. With prejudices in the world of football, players of his characteristics have been received with doubts at best, with rejection too many times and with reduced expectations almost always.
It is very difficult to win the battle between perception and reality. Labels tend to impose themselves, established ideas that require a bestial effort to shake them off. In this aspect, David Silva participated in the very front row in a revolution without parion. Never have so many, so good and so small rebelled against the established order, with no other basis than the clichés in use. And a more resounding triumph has never been seen: Silva is the archetype of the player who radically changed the conventions of the game and put an end to the dominant criterion of what used to be called modernity, the most traditional and debatable of the adjectives that preside over opinions in football.
Silva, and that band of geniuses, to which Modric and other notable successors were soon added – Bernardo Silva, for example – retires after a work that suddenly changed the typical account of a game that went in one direction and suddenly took the opposite, led by the Spanish national team, Barça and later Manchester City. In his case he got it right away, from the first moment. At the age of 18, he arrived at Eibar, in theory the least advisable of the teams for a player of his characteristics, and confirmed in the mud of Ipurúa not only his ingenuity, but the courage and competitive vigor that has characterized his career.
The king of the break and the filtered pass retires, fierce competitor and flag of the teams he has passed through, from the first to the last. At the age of 37, at Real Sociedad, who will play in the Champions League this season, he was sidelined by a knee injury. Ask Imanol Alguacil, Zubimendi, the Donostia fans about Silva, and the answer will be unanimous: nothing will be the same without him.
