He was supposed to have a bigger career than Messi, with whom he worked brilliantly in Barcelona’s youth teams. But then, also due to a serious injury, he was unable to unleash his undoubtedly enormous potential. Today Victor Vazquez is 37 years old and plays for… Andorra. El Clasico broadcast on Saturday, October 26 Eleven Sports 1 at 9 p.m. The studio starts at 6:00 p.m.
Due to their year of birth and incredible potential, they were called the Class of ’87. Leo Messi, Cesc Fabregas and Gerard Pique formed a virtually unbeatable team in the FC Barcelona academy. In the 2002/03 season, as the U15 team, they did not lose even a single point. However, they were not the only ones who were predicted great careers. The real sensation was the extremely versatile Victor Vazquez. He could play anywhere. On both wings, in midfield and even as a striker. And he was equally good everywhere.
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– I remember that Messi and Víctor were definitely the best players in our team. Sometimes they fought in direct duels. If one scored four goals in a match, the other scored five – recalled Fabregas.
Better than Messi? Verification
At that time, there were many opinions that Vazquez was even better than Messi at that stage of his football adventure. But then their paths diverged dramatically. While the Argentine broke into Barcelona’s senior team as a teenager and quickly began to make a splash, his contemporary was stuck in the club’s reserves.
Ultimately, Vazquez played only three matches for the first team. First, under Frank Rijkaard’s leadership, he spent 15 minutes on the pitch during a league match against Recreativo Huelva, and then, during Pep Guardiola’s term, he showed up in the Champions League against Shakhtar Donetsk and Rubin Kazan. In what turned out to be his farewell performance against the latter opponent, he even scored a goal, making the match 2-0:
Significantly, Vazquez played each of these matches in a different season. Therefore, he was unable to establish himself in the Camp Nou team for good, and he appeared on the pitch from a big bell, especially when “Blaugrana” was playing for parsley.
So what happened to such a great talent, supposedly one of the greatest in the history of La Masia? While Vazquez still looked good in football, his physical problems were becoming more and more noticeable. He lost his once impressive speed, and a serious knee injury, which at one point sidelined him for over nine months, left a lasting mark.
Preferably in Belgium and overseas
Eventually, it became clear that Vazquez no longer had a future at Camp Nou. The Belgian Club Brugge extended a helping hand to the then 24-year-old midfielder and signed him without a fee. And this, as it later turned out, was a very good move for the Catalan. First of all, he started playing regularly, gained a lot of trust, and played not only in the league, but also in European cups. He clearly revived, and the injuries that had previously left their mark on him no longer stuck with him. He shined primarily in the midfield, although from time to time he was thrown into other positions.
Ultimately, the La Masia graduate stayed in Bruges for four and a half years. He played 170 games, scored 25 goals, and made 50 assists, which were his trademark. In a record season, his teammates scored 16 goals, which is an impressive result. Moreover, my CV included successes. Club ones, such as the championship and the national cup, as well as individual ones, because after the 2014/15 season, the Catalan was chosen player of the year in Belgium.
Finally, Vazquez, aware that he was unlikely to have a career like his former colleagues from Barcelona, decided to play the globetrotter. He could have written off his short adventure with Mexican Cruz Azul as a loss, but he fared much better with Toronto FC. There, he impressed on MLS pitches for two seasons. He was included in the best eleven of the season, won the local cup, and numerically it was also quite specific, because this is probably how we can describe his achievements of 18 goals and 17 assists in 77 matches.
Continuation of the tour
In the following years, Vazquez continued his football journeys around almost the entire world, usually with poor results. He played for two clubs from Qatar, returned to Belgium for a moment, where he terminated the contract with Eupen after… one match, and then, as a player quite recognized abroad, he received a loan of trust from Los Angeles Galaxy. He had some decent recent performances for this club, although he was far from the form he had when he represented Toronto. He returned to the latter team in 2023, but lost most of the season due to an injury.
Today, Vazquez is a player of FC Santa Coloma, a club from… Andorra. He got there quite recently after a several-month adventure in India. He has played only once for the team he currently represents. For 27 minutes. He is already 37 years old and is inevitably getting closer to hanging up his boots, gradually lowering the bar.
He was supposed to make a great career, he was said to outshine Messi himself, and in his old age he kicks football in a country where, according to the UEFA rankings, only Gibraltar and San Marino have a worse league than in Europe, according to the UEFA rankings. It happens anyway. Vazquez is, of course, not the first, and certainly not the last, player who was supposed to conquer the world of football but ended up on its periphery. Even in the history of FC Barcelona we have seen many such cases.
