Raúl Albiol: A “fine wine” kind of player
By Tiago De Veth
If there’s one thing that Raúl Albiol has shown this season is that he’s like a fine wine — he just gets better with age. Playing the best football of his career at 36 years old, Albiol has redefined limits captaining Villarreal to the UEFA Champions League semi-finals. To be performing at his prime in his late 30s is some feat and one that has quite frankly been marvelled at by the footballing world.
Raúl Albiol: “No me canso de jugar y entrenar, no puedo parar.”
Raúl Albiol: “I don’t get tired of playing and training, I can’t stop.”
These are Albiol’s words at the start of 2022, when little did he know that he would lead the Yellows to the club’s second Champions League semi-final in 16 years and would do so by earning the Man of the Match against an ‘unbeatable’ Bayern Munich side in the quarter-finals in which he dominated one of the world’s best strikers, Robert Lewandowski, throughout.
Albiol came to Villarreal CF in the 2019/20 season. Many were excited to see the ex-Real Madrid and Spanish defender come back to LaLiga. Expectations weren’t too high for the 33-year-old centre back as he was only able to play 20 games the previous season for Napoli.
He quickly became one of the key players for the Yellow Submarine though, playing 38 games and keeping13 clean sheets in his first season and helping Villarreal to finish 5th in LaLiga and qualify for the Europa League, but this was just the beginning.
Albiol had a very interesting career before joining the Yellow Submarine. He was born on 4th September 1985 in Vilamarxant, Spain. A small town on the outskirts of Valencia. He started playing football at a local club called Ribarroja CF at the age of nine. Very few people believed that this slim kid was one day going to turn football into his profession and go down as one of the most complete defenders in football history.
His professional career started on the 24th September 2003 with Valencia CF in a UEFA Cup game against AIK FC. That season Valencia CF would go on to win the UEFA Cup trophy. Only three years later in 2006, he was already approached by one of the biggest clubs worldwide, Real Madrid, but he instead decided to extend his contract with Valencia CF until 2011.
In 2006 he won the LaLiga Breakthrough Player of the year which meant many clubs want to get a piece of Albiol. And things only got better and better for Albiol as he won the Copa del Rey (Spanish Cup)with Valencia CF and the European Championships with Spain in 2008. One year later he decided it was time for a change and moved to ‘los galácticos’, Real Madrid, for 15 million Euros.
At Real Madrid, Albiol showed the world that he can perform at the highest level. He managed to help the team win the Copa del Rey in 2011, LaLiga in 2012 and the Spanish Super Cup in 2013; but his biggest achievement of all was winning the FIFA World Cup with Spain in 2010 to become a world champion.
In 2013 he suddenly moved to the Serie A, to one of the most successful clubs in Italy, SSC Napoli. Albiol played in Italy for six consecutive seasons and was able to win the Coppa Italia and the Italian Super Cup before joining the Yellow Submarine.
Albiol had a great debut season with Villarreal CF and his second was even better. He played a total of 47 games, finished 7th in LaLiga, but most importantly won the first European Competition for his own career and Villarreal CF. He didn’t only win it, he kept on showing the world that age does not mean anything and at 35 years old there is still a chance to win one of the biggest competitions in Europe.
In the 2021/22 season, Albiol showed no signs of slowing down. If anything, he’s speeding up. His previous experience playing in Serie A was a great help for Villarreal CF as they faced Atalanta in the Group Stages and later Italian giant Juventus FC in the Round of 16, who they went on to beat with an emphatic 0–3 second leg at the Allianz Stadium to go through to the quarter-finals.
This was clearly not enough for Raúl Albiol who gave the performance of a lifetime in a so-called “impossible” game against Bayern Munich. There was a lot of pressure on Raúl Albiol having to defend one of the best strikers in the world, Robert Lewandoski.
Not only did Raúl Albiol manage to show that he was capable of keeping Lewandoski at bay but also played spectacularly in the second leg to win his first Man of the Match award at the age of 36. This made him the oldest Spanish player to be awarded a Man of the Match in a semi-final of a Champions League game.
Now in his third season with Villarreal CF, Yellows fans can’t get enough of Albiol and are hoping that he stays longer since age doesn’t seem to stop him.
