Gavi’s recovery from injury: Spotify playlists, swimming and finally smiles

Gavi He took off his warm-up shirt and headed to the substitutes’ bench. It was the 83rd minute Barcelona‘s La Liga game against Seville 10 days ago, when Hansi Flick’s team was leading 4:0.

As he prepared to take the field, the crowd at the Estadio Luis Companys rose to give Gavi a standing ovation. After almost a year of absence due to knee anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) injuryThe 20-year-old midfielder was returning.

Gavi couldn’t hide his smile. His teammates applauded him and the player he replaced: Pedrigave him the captain’s armband. Central defender Inigo Martinez raised his fists as if celebrating a goal.

It will be one of several boosts for Barcelona in a special week following their 5-1 win over Bayern Munich 4-1 at home. Champions League And Real Madrid thrashed 4-0 away in El Clasico. The contrast to when Gavi first suffered his injury could not be more stark.

This happened in European Championship qualifying match against Georgia last November. Three weeks earlier, Xavi’s Barca side suffered their first major blow in their La Liga title defense when they lost the Clasico 2-1. Jude Bellingham-Inspired by Madrid on Montjuïc.

Gavi was Barcelona’s best player in that Clasico and one of the standout players at the start of last season. When he stopped in control of the ball in the first half of Georgia’s game in Valladolid – after being hit three minutes earlier – it was immediately clear that he had seriously injured his right knee.

The young man returned to Barcelona, ​​where he was examined by club doctors. It was decided that he would need surgery; an operation that lasted from an hour to an hour and a half. The new documentary Gavi: The Return, produced by the club’s Barca One channel, shows what he went through.

Gavi wanted to return home as soon as possible after the operation. He stayed in hospital for a day and left the next morning, but after two hours he had to ask his physiotherapist Pablo Merino to take him back.

“It was excruciating pain,” he says in the Barca One documentary. “Those who have there was such a trauma know what I mean. I didn’t want to do anything. I didn’t want to see anyone for a month, I just wanted to be alone at home. The first month was very difficult.”

Gavi couldn’t rush his recovery. Physiotherapist consultations Athletic at the time of the injury, he noted that a relapse could have serious consequences and that he would have to be patient. He faced a minimum suspension of 10 months.

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There have already been cases in Barcelona that have shown the importance of waiting. Ansu Fati suffered Several relapses and I had to undergo surgery four times to correct a meniscus problem in the left knee. The 21-year-old returned to Barca after a loan spell at Brighton last season. Premier League but he has yet to return to his pre-injury best.

Pedri, meanwhile, has suffered several muscle injuries since playing. 73 games for club and country in his breakthrough 2020/21 season, although without the same impact as Fati. Barca were on high alert to keep Gavi out of the situation. similar situation like this couple.

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Gavi chose Merino as his physiotherapist and together they worked on his comeback.

Instead of thinking about when he will play again, they set small goals for him to help him achieve it, such as when he can go out for drinks with friends, when he can walk again without crutches, when he can run . He was able to take his first steps without crutches 40 days after the operation, walking around Barça’s Joan Gamper training ground, accompanied by his physiotherapist. When he felt his surgically repaired leg getting tired, he stopped.

He and Merino continued their recovery, only taking a break for Christmas. He used an exercise bike and spent time in the swimming pool of the Hotel Sofia, near Barcelona’s Camp Nou stadium (the club’s training ground has neither a swimming pool nor a water recovery system).

This was a big boost for Gavi, who was able to get into the water with crutches, but after diving could do without them completely. “He could work on elements like elasticity and certain gestures that were unthinkable outside the water,” Merino told Barca One. “He found himself again just by being able to walk.”

Just over two months after his recovery, Gavi was joined by two more physiotherapists: Jon Alvarez and Juan Carlos Perez. He spent time with them on the beach or in the mountains to have fun. During this second stage of his recovery, they had daily sessions with him for the first seven months. On some days they worked in the morning and afternoon.

They didn’t talk about football with Gavi, but helped him relax by discussing other topics. One of them was a “recovery playlist” that they posted on Spotify. The selection surprised some on social media, with songs including “Unwritten” by Natasha Bedingfield, “Baby” by Justin Bieber and Ludacris and “Tubthumping” by Chumbawamba. It also featured Blur, Michael Jackson, Nirvana, AC/DC, Florence & The Machine and the American band The National.

The choice may not seem unusual to British or American readers, but it is fitting for a footballer from Spain, where reggaeton, a music genre originating in Panama, has taken over dressing rooms.

Physiotherapists also encouraged Gavi to be patient, encouraging him to take his time when it comes to re-working the ball or thinking about his end goal. Merino took a photo with him every time they took another step to encourage further progress: the first day he could walk again, the first day he could run, the first day he could touch the ball, etc. d.

Club sources, who like everyone mentioned in this article wish to remain anonymous to protect the relationship, say Gavi took every step very seriously and approached them all with great rigor.

He traveled with the Barca team in early April when they played the first leg of the Champions League quarter-final against Paris Saint-Germain. He surveyed the Parc des Princes pitch as his teammates trained but did not kick balls to them, instead bending over to pick them up and throw them – a sign of how seriously he was taking his recovery.

All this played a key role in Gavi’s return after 11 months. He was able to pass the ball again at the end of July, returned to the group in mid-September and his return finally came in a game on 20 October against Sevilla, 336 days after that fateful performance in Spain’s match against Georgia.

Since then, Flick has given him 14 minutes, including that game and brief cameos against Bayern and Madrid. His reassimilation will be gradual, thanks to Barcelona’s well-stocked midfield, where Mark Casado, Fermin Lopez And Dani Olmo everything is in good shape.

In the three short substitute appearances that Gavi has made so far, he has once again shown all his character, desire and strength.

Barça’s “heart on legs”, as Xavi called him, looks to be back and here to stay.

(Top photo: Dennis Agyeman/Europa Press via Getty Images)