Box-to-box midfielders call them midfielders in England, who both conquer balls in front of their own penalty area and prepare goals in front of the opponent's sixteenth place. In Spain, such footballers have become rare, strive for the Iberians but the technically perfect short-pass and smiles the joy of running, which is necessary to overcome great distances, even in compensation for lack of technical skills. Therefore, it is no coincidence that Atlético Madrid is now attracting attention with fast, vertical play and expansive steps. In this club, Argentinian coach Diego Simeone has been playing his idea of football for years and not the Iberian - which is why football aesthetes on the peninsula are snarling about him a bit.
However, Thomas Partey from Ghana shows no technical inadequacies even after hard physical exercise and long sprints. On Tuesday in the Champions League encounter against Leverkusen he wants to put his teammates back in this way and block the enemy attacks. It did not look like it was going to make its big breakthrough this season. Although left midfielder Rodrigo Hernández, who could never get used to the tactics Simeone's, Atlético in the direction of Manchester. However, the club brought Marcos Llorente from Real Madrid and Herrera from Porto. In addition, Simeone has already awarded two regular places in midfield to Saúl Ñíguez and Koke.
Simeone loves the vertical way of playing
But now the coach relies on Thomas, as they call him in Madrid, without his last name. In eleven games he has used the 26-year-olds nine times, almost always from the beginning. His best game made Thomas just 0-0 against the city rivals Real Madrid, an encounter that had baptized the Spanish media because of the underground level as a "game of nothingness". Only in Thomas did they see a ray of light and chose him as the best player. A few days later, Thomas was again in the premier class in the 2-0 Atléticos at Lokomotiv Moscow again to the main player in the field. The 2: 0 he scored after he had initiated the move with a ball capture in his own field. The new entrants Llorente and Herrera, competitors in the position of the Ghanaians, however, come so far only a few minutes.
Coach Simeone loves this vertical style of play, as it allows a quick and dangerous switching game. Thomas is often the first point of reference for the centre-back in Atlético's build-up, he is ball safe, keeps dropping off his opponents, either continues to play for a short time and then moves forward himself or plays the ball long, tearing open the defenders' lines of defense. He plays more passes than his teammates, many of them in half of the opponent, 90 percent of them reach his teammates. After coach Zidane revealed to present the determined Thomas also at Real Madrid, Atlético negotiates with him about an early contract extension. Atlético wants to take a transfer fee of 100 million euros in the contract, Spanish media report.
The way to the regular rivals umgarnten main player was far. Thomas Partey comes from Krobo Obdumase in the southeast of Ghana. His father is coach of the local club. But when the eldest of a total of eight brothers boarded the plane to Madrid seven years ago, he wanted to keep it from the family. The father had long since financed his journey without the knowledge of his son. Because he came to Spain without a contract, only with the assurance of his Spanish agent, to be allowed to play at Spanish clubs. So he finally landed at the U19 Atléticos. He never accepted his family's money for the trip, Thomas told the BBC two years ago, which in 2017 ranked him among the top five football players in Africa.
After only four months in the U19 and a season in the B-Elf Atléticos lent him the club in 2013 to Mallorca. The club then played in the second Spanish league. At first he caused a lot of free kicks and lost a lot of balls, he recalls today. The rest of his teammates impressed him, who could run the ball through their own ranks without getting nervous. After just one year, he moved to Almería in the first Spanish professional league, where on the course everything went much faster. He did the simple things, conquered balls and adapted them to the next player.