Barcelona legend Sergio Busquets has confirmed that he is to depart the Blaugrana in the summer, after 15 years in the club’s first team.
As expected, Barcelona captain Sergio Busquets has announced that he is leaving the LaLiga giants at the end of the season. The midfielder confirmed the news in a video posted by Barça on Wednesday, in which the club youth product looked back on his long career with the Blaugrana.
Set to add 32nd winners’ medal to Barcelona collection
Busquets, who will be 36 in July, has won 31 major trophies with Barça - and is poised to secure his 32nd. Thirteen points clear at the top of LaLiga with five games to play, Xavi Hernández’s men are on the verge of sealing this season’s Spanish title.
Among Busquets’ silverware haul at Barça is the sextuple won by the Catalans in 2009: under Pep Guardiola, the team won LaLiga, the Copa del Rey, the Champions League, the Spanish Super Cup, the UEFA Super Cup and the Club World Cup within the same calendar year. Busquets was the last remaining member of that side.
The Spain international, a World Cup winner in 2010, also helped Barça to a LaLiga and Champions League double in 2010/11 and a domestic and European treble in 2014/15.
Third on Barça’s all-time appearances list
Since being given his first-team debut in 2008, Busquets has played 719 times for the club. If he features in every remaining league game this term, he’ll increase that figure to 724. He is the club’s third-highest appearance maker, behind only Xavi (767) and Lionel Messi (778). In the 15 years since his Barça bow, Busquets has missed just 15 matches through injury.
Promoted to first team for 2008 Racing clash
Brought into the first team by Guardiola, who was won over by the simplicity of his game, Busquets made his senior debut in a LaLiga clash with Racing Santander in September 2008. The selection attracted criticism, with some observers comparing his inclusion in the side to Johan Cruyff’s failed experiment with youth product Jesús Julián Lucendo in 1989. However, Busquets went on to prove that Guardiola had blooded a future club legend.
Busquets “makes difficult things look easy,” Cruyff said of the player 2008. “He plays one or two-touch stuff and constantly offers defensive masterclasses, because he’s always in exactly the right place.”