Federico Redondo: The Argentine pivot who could be the heir to Sergio Busquets’ throne – scout report

Pep Guardiola has finally lifted the UEFA Champions League, 12 years after his last triumph against Manchester United in Wembley back in 2011.

While City were the greatest evolution of Pep’s tactics, his Barcelona side at the beginning of the previous decade were revolutionary and are often deemed to be the best side to ever play this beautiful sport.

One of the key cogs to that immortal side was Sergio Busquets. While Lionel Messi, Andrés Iniesta, David Villa and Xavi Hernández earned all the plaudits, El Pulpo was the glue that held La Blaugrana together and is often regarded as the greatest lone ‘6’ of all time.

Busquets recently announced his departure from the Catalan giants after close to two decades with the club where he won practically every competition for club and country apart from the UEFA Europa League.

The 34-year-old is now the very last member of the infamous 2011 squad to leave the five-time European champions and Barcelona may have an incredibly difficult time replacing their midfield anchor.

However, there is one player out there who may be worth taking a chance on, a controller in the middle of the park who is currently learning from two of Busquets’ former Barcelona teammates – Javier Mascherano and Gabriel Milito. That player is Federico Redondo.

Those of a certain age demographic will remember Fede’s father, Fernando Redondo, a former three-time European champion with Real Madrid and Milan. Well, it turns out that Fernando has a talented son who is already being linked with some of Europe’s biggest clubs and, of course, given the need for a new number ‘6’, Barca are among these supposed suitors. 

This scout report will be a tactical analysis of Redondo’s style of play, as well as his strengths, weaknesses and his role within the tactics of the Liga Profesional side Argentinos Juniors but we shall also compare the technically-gifted Argentine’s data with Busquets to see if he can truly fill the Spaniard’s large boots.

Player profile

While we don’t want to make this entire analysis piece about Busquets and continuously putting such a young talent on the same projection as one of the greatest midfielders of his generation, the comparison with regard to each player’s physical build is stark. 

Redondo is 6’2”, or approximately 188cm, according to Wyscout, while also weighing in at 75kg, or 165lbs. In contrast, Busquets is 189cm in height and just under 170lbs in weight.  

When coming through the academy system, there were some critics of Guardiola who believed the future genius was making a mistake by deploying Busquets in the number ‘6’ position over someone like Yaya Touré. From a physical standpoint, there was no comparison between the duo. Busquets looked dainty and had skinny legs, with what looked like little upper body strength. 

These observations weren’t necessarily wrong, but they didn’t hold Busquets back at all. In fact, Busquets became the player he did in spite of these deficiencies. 

Why is this relevant? Well, Redondo looks eerily similar in terms of stature to Busquets. If you squinted while watching the 20-year-old, you may even struggle to tell the difference. 

The average positioning of the two men is slightly different too. The reason for this is that Argentinos Juniors boss Milito prefers to deploy a 3-4-2-1 with a double-pivot in midfield. Redondo normally operates on the right. However, Busquets has almost exclusively played as a lone pivot and so his heatmap shows a lot more action in the central areas. 

Nevertheless, Redondo certainly can play as a single pivot and has done so in the past, but has primarily played on the right of a two. 

Now that we’ve discussed Redondo’s position on the football pitch and his role under Milito, let’s deep-dive into his role in and out of possession.