After leaving in the summer of 2016, Alves once again appeared on the pitch wearing a Barça shirt.
In this Copa del Rey match against Atlético Linares, he delivered 7 key passes to the goal, 3 successful passes, 14 1-on-1 wins and 9!
It's hard to believe that the Brazilian right-back is 38 years old. Once Messi's best partner, he is now the confidant who knows Dembele best.
Not a successful first half: Zhiyin less string break who listens
After five and a half years, Alves once again made his debut for Barca. Under Harvey's 3142 formation, Alves is a positioning between the right and the right midfielder. Akhomach is nominally a striker, swimming more onto the flanks, allowing Alves to converge inwards as a point of possession.
The offensive logic was originally that Akhomać and Albarra opened the width, nico and Phuket inserted themselves in the box and wrapped up the middle with Jutegra. However, Jutegra was generally efficient in grabbing points in front of goal, missing opportunities in the middle of the cross after multiple wing breaks.
When Harvey arranged the attack, there was a large area of transposition between the players. Switching between the middle and the wing is very frequent, which is a testament to the high quality of his training.
This time Alves inserted the ribs and crossed, and Nico then directly inserted Akhomachi, which was the most eye-catching positional battle coordination of Barca in the first half, but unfortunately the youngster's shot was deflected.
Alves is not a defensive player after all, and his defensive stats may be pretty good (high precision of the lower foot, high pressing and counter-breaking ability), but there are some problems when landing.
Barca's conceded goal, Purgy did not grab the cross is the source, the middle of the road Alves did not realize that the opponent went behind him to enlarge the space in the middle, causing Garcia to stand in the premise, but also let Mingosa need to defend the opposing player one-on-one.
It is clear from the GIF that Alves was supposed to protect Busquets as a right midfielder, but this time he was unaware of the opponent's movement. Garcia himself is a player with a slow turn, and it is impossible to retreat from the front and back.
Mingosa couldn't keep up with the striker in La Liga B, it wasn't so surprising, and the loss of the ball came.
3 counter-substitutions at halftime: Alves finds a more accurate positioning
Trailing 0-1 at halftime, Harvey was very decisive in making three substitutions. Dembele replaced youngster Akhomach, making Barca's attack more threatening.
Alves is more oriented towards the right midfielder, and he plays a good role as a ribbed fulcrum (taking the ball in the offensive advance and quickly reversing the ball), allowing Dembele to play better.
As can be seen from the GIF, Alves's foot over the top to find De Jong is enough to rival Busquets. Unfortunately, De Jong faced the opportunity and once again was unable to exert his strength when he made a sideways movement and failed to kick the ball.
Looking at this attack again, Alves has a strong ability to stop and take the ball, and has a good one-foot passing ability. Through his wing-side or rib pivot role in midfield, Barca made several very good offensive and defensive transitions.
Unfortunately, this time Jutegra crossed to Dembele, whose shot was deflected.
How did Barca's goal of equalising come about? It was still a return pass from Alves after resisting the defense, and then Mingoza found Dembele to attack.
The Frenchman scored a wonderful goal in a very Messi way, allowing Barca to get out of the passive situation of falling behind.
As you can see from the statistics, Alves sent a total of 7 key passes to bring shots in this game, while creating 2 excellent scoring opportunities. In addition, he won 9 of the 14 one-on-one confrontations and 3 successful times, and the data is perfect.
Men who know Messi also know Dembele: their combination is one notch higher
Fans who have seen Alves at the pinnacle of Barcelona have grown from children to youth and even middle age. The veteran was once Messi's best partner and is now Dembele's confidant.
Looking at such a collision with the wall and the continuous movement of the pass, you will not have the illusion of seeing Messi and Alves back then.
Of course, Dembele's shots are not as good as Messi's, and he cannot directly send the opportunity to successfully advance to the front of the penalty area into the bottom of the net.
Let's take a look at the fit this time, With Alves closing in the middle and Dembele on the opposite side. When the ball was transferred, Alves did not touch the ball, but his no-ball movement gave Dembele some help.
The missing ball was given to the Frenchman and Barca had a chance to flank. The opponent's resolute foul this time allowed Barca to win a free kick. Alves then took the penalty and found Dembele at the back of the penalty area, but unfortunately the header was high.
Dembele's impressive game was a goal and a consecutive shot over the crossbar, but many will overlook Dembele's other solo masterpiece. The source of the Frenchman's continuous breakthrough after starting speed this time lies in Alves's back-and-forth after switching to the wing to open the width.
In this Barca reversal, Dembele is the number one hero, and Alves is the best partner behind him.
Conclusion
Alves is 38 years old and his return to Barcelona is not a future. But even if he only looks at the moment, he can still give the team some help.
If you let him compress his physical expenditure at some key moments and only play 20-30 minutes, I believe there will be more surprises.
If Barca can make good use of the combination of Alves and Dembele in the second half of the season, they may also be able to "open the road and meet the water" in some critical moments.