Remember this "Spanish demon knife" who specializes in world waves?
He was born in La Masia but played at Liverpool. He has a unique style of play, and his small man can score headers and blast all kinds of world waves. Anfield still sings songs written for him by fans from time to time, and "Ghost Goal" and the subsequent Champions League final are still big players in football.
He is Luis Garcia, a man who has left an important mark in La Liga and the Premier League, known as "the most alternative demon knife".
[Young, but "late bloomer"]
In those years, the Spanish media often used words like "late bloomer" when describing Luis Garcia. It sounds a bit strange, because a player who made his La Liga debut at 21 and won the Champions League at 27 should not be called that.
But if you dig deeper into his upbringing and debut, you'll see why the Spaniards say that.
Garcia was born in 1978 in Badalona, within the Barcelona metropolitan area. Such a birth point, you can imagine which club your childhood dream will be. However, he started playing football at the age of 6, entered two junior football schools, and watched as many friends around him were invited to try out in La Masia, but he did not get the opportunity until he was 12 years old.
After that, in the Barça Academy, his situation was still a bit delicate. It would be more apt to say it – not up and down.
In every youth team, Garcia is the main force in the forward line, but the goals are neither too many nor too few. The younger players who were worse than him went to other teams or simply changed careers, and the various jumping monsters who were better than him played in La Liga early, while Garcia fell into a life cycle between the ages of 19 and 21.
Team B performed well, rewarded to go to the first team to train→ but there is Rivaldo in the same position, after training or go back to continue to support Team B→ scoring goals in Team B and being promoted to the first team again→ I heard that you have changed your playing style now? But that new position has Figo...
In this way, Garcia stumbled to the age of 21 as the main player of the B team/A team soy sauce, and he and the club felt that he had to change his life. So in the 1999-20 season, Barca decided to loan him out to work out.
The first stop was Valladolid, who played 6 La Liga games and chose to return. The second stop was Toledo, who scored four goals in the second division in half a year, and the opponent said that he would not renew his loan.
22-year-old Garcia has come to a crossroads in his life. If there is no chance to turn things around, I am afraid that it will be the same as countless giants of youth training products, and it will be mixed up in the lower leagues for a lifetime.
Then he met a coach who changed his fate - Benitez.
At that time, Benitez was still coaching Tenerife in La B, keen to pick up the "scraps" of the giants to build the squad. Up front, he already has Mista who is a Real Madrid youth academy like himself, and needs a winger or a second striker to support the attack.
And what he fancy is Luis Garcia.
But when Garcia came to Tenerife on loan, Benitez initially felt "no, I may have been scammed". In his vision, the youth training of giants often means advanced tactical literacy, strict discipline and execution, but Garcia's main game is a card that does not play according to the routine.
Benitez later said in an interview: "There was a game when I suddenly saw Garcia running blindly to a position where he shouldn't have been, and I was already very upset. Then he actually received the ball there and shot directly from distance, and I was ready to sneer, and as a result... The goal went in. Okay, it seems that I was wrong. ”
This is Garcia, an all-rounder who can play in all positions of the striker, but can never force him into any position.
Tenerife's tactics that season revolved entirely around his duo with Mista and Garcia scored 16 goals in 40 La B games and the team managed to be promoted to La Liga.
At the end of the season, Benitez was poached by Valencia and has since embarked on the road of world fame. Garcia was loaned by Barca to Valladolid for another year in La B and was signed by Atletico Madrid for 3.6 million euros.
Luis Garcia, 24, really got the chance to prove himself in La Liga.
【The highest light, on the other side of the sea】
Atletico in the 02-03 season were still a mid-table team struggling to rebuild, and eventually only finished 12th in the league. But if there is any shining point in the team, Garcia, who scored nine goals in his first full La Liga season, is certainly one.
It was precisely because of this performance that Barca immediately activated the buyback clause, returning the transfer fee paid by Atletico Madrid plus an additional 1.4 million euros to take him back.
At this point in the story, many people thought that the next step must be the plot of "the wandering prodigal son proves himself and returns to his hometown to create glory again", but that year and Garcia came to Barça at the same time, and there were two people whose positions somewhat overlapped. One is named Ronaldinho, and the other is Quaresma, who was used to benchmark with Cristiano Ronaldo to join Manchester United.
To be fair, in that budding year, Rijkaard also gave Garcia a lot of opportunities. But on the one hand, Garcia's style of play is really too unique, and many coaches are not sure how much freedom to give him; On the other hand, there are too many young players in the Barça midfield who want to train, in addition to Ronaldo and Quaresma, there are also Xavi, Andres Iniesta and Saviola... Oh yes, and there's another B-Team Beet who is about to be upgraded and named Leo Messi.
If you get through it, Garcia may also be a piece of Yumeji's rotation puzzle. Go out, this time I really want to say goodbye to my children's dreams. How to choose? Garcia was hesitant.
But when an invitation arrived, he made his decision almost instantaneously. Because the manager who sent the invitation was Benitez again.
In 2004, Benitez became Liverpool manager and began building his "Spanish gang" in the Premier League. Including Xavi Alonso, Luis Garcia, Morientes and Josemi, the Reds' two transfer windows brought in six players from La Liga at once.
This style caused a lot of controversy in public opinion at that time. Most of the most questionable firing points were concentrated on Garcia.
For example, "I don't know if La Liga players are parallel goods when they arrive in the Premier League", "What do strikers without body and speed buy them", "£6 million is afraid that the manager has withdrawn the deduction", and most importantly: "After Owen is gone, you give such a Barca abandonment to wear No. 10?!" ”
Throughout the ages, such ridicule in football circles has never stopped. And the only effective way to fight back has never changed: on the pitch, with your feet talking.
In his first 10 games, Garcia scored three goals for Liverpool, including a powerful kick against Charlton. Anfield fans have always liked this way of scoring goals, and no one said he was "tough enough" and started singing for him instead: "Oh Luis Garcia, he's from Barcelona, but he brings us the best joy!" ”
But the Reds fans at the time did not know that the real joy was yet to come.
That season, Garcia scored 13 goals for the team and tied for the team's top scorer. And more crucially, a large part of these goals have come in key games such as the Champions League.
In the round of 16, he scored three goals over two legs against Bayer Leverkusen, helping an injury-threatening team eliminate the in-form pharmaceutical company.
Facing Juventus in the quarter-finals, he first assisted Hypia's goal, and then fired a blast directly from outside the box. Thuram in front, Emerson behind him, Cannavaro in pursuit, and Buffon in front of goal, Juve superstars did not expect him to choose to shoot, and play such a shot.
"I may only have one chance like this, but I know it will be my chance."
In the last four, the opponents were Jose Mourinho and his Chelsea. In the second leg, he took advantage of the chaos in the box in the opening 4th minute, and the ball was cleared by Gala on the goal line, and the referee determined that the ball had crossed the goal line as a whole. "It's not my prettiest goal, but it's the most important one!"
It was with this famous "ghost goal" that Liverpool finally beat the Blues 1-0 on aggregate and reached the Champions League final.
There is no need to say much about the latter story. Istanbul, 0-3, intermission, 3-3. Penalty shootout, dancing Dudek, incredible reversal.
Garcia and his teammates, who played the whole game, held the long-awaited Big Ear Cup.
On the way to winning the title, Liverpool were not favored by public opinion in almost every round, but they defeated one strong opponent after another. Garcia played a crucial role in the whole process, and the more critical the game, the more crucial the play.
One Spanish newspaper commented: "Garcia is neither Ronaldo nor Irving, nor a center like Morientes. He can swim on the wing and is a natural second striker. He can pass the ball on both wings, shoot from distance in the front, and can go without the ball in the ribs and insert into the box. Such players are the worst to defend, especially against giants whose ordinary tricks don't work. ”
After his first year of glory, Garcia played two seasons at Liverpool, although injuries plagued him with declining attendance and statistics. But there are still highlight moments such as the European Super Cup overtime victory and the FA Cup defeat against Chelsea again, and the tough battle continues to never be soft.
In 2007, Garcia left Liverpool to join Atletico again as part of Torres' transfer. His farewell message to Reds fans was: "If it makes the team stronger, then I'm willing to go." ”
【"Football is love that never changes"】
Returning to La Liga after three years of Premier League should have been a happy thing for Garcia. But his knee injury worsened, and after playing 30 games for Atletico in his first season, his form gradually declined significantly.
In 2009, he left Atletico Madrid for Atletico Santander, but there are still not many matches he can play. A season later, the 32-year-old Garcia joined Panathinaikos to experience the world with football. Mexico, India and Australia have left his footprints, including a comeback after a brief retirement in 2014.
Some people say that Garcia was born at an opportune time, and with his omnipotence and spirituality, by this era, he can be transformed into a pseudo-number nine with a larger range of activities, and his career should be more brilliant.
Garcia himself said: "The world is big, and the world of football is big. I've seen enough scenery and traveled enough places that I don't have any regrets. ”
In 2016, Garcia announced that he was hanging up his boots, bidding farewell to his reluctant playing career. But the connection with football has never stopped.
He often appears in the media's comment booth, especially about the two clubs Barca and Liverpool. He said in 2020: "Messi is showing something different every year, he will adapt himself to the needs of the team and I believe he has five years left at his peak. He also said that "Takumi Minamino reminds me of Philippe Coutinho and who he used to be, and it's a pity he didn't adapt better", and "Elliott reminds me of Xavi and Iniesta, with a Barça sense of position and possession." ”
You can also often see Garcia in Liverpool's various veterans, and he even now regularly contacts the landlords of Liverpool. "I've been away for years, but they still message me and sing to me when I go to Anfield, and that makes me feel like I've never left."