Messi came on.
He had gone to the touchline in the fifty-fifth minute to wait for a dead-ball opportunity, then entered the field in the fifty-seventh.
What was somewhat unexpected, however, was that he did not replace Sergi Roberto, but Rakitić.
It had to be said that this was a change even Yang Yang and Zidane found extremely surprising, because it made no sense.
Barcelona had now lost control of the midfield. Messi's introduction was clearly meant to link up the midfield and attack, organizing and orchestrating their offense, while Rakitić was Barcelona's stabilizer in midfield. It could even be said that he was an important link in both their attacking and defensive play.
They had left Roberto, who had been performing poorly on the right, on the field, yet substituted Rakitić?
It was truly difficult to understand.
After the substitution, Roberto moved into midfield to partner Busquets and Iniesta, while Messi appeared on the right wing. This also showed that Enrique was trying to change the situation in Barcelona's midfield.
In the hands of Robert Moreno, the Assistant Coach standing behind Enrique, was a tablet computer. It contained an app—real-time match data software purchased by Barcelona. On it, the passing routes of Barcelona's entire team were densely displayed.
This matched Barcelona's current situation. They had nearly seventy percent possession, and both their number of passes and passing accuracy were high. Their passing was particularly concentrated between their own thirty-meter line and Real Madrid's thirty-meter line. In that area, Barcelona's passing routes were so dense that they looked like woven fabric, crisscrossing in every direction and making it dazzling to watch.
What was astonishing, however, was that Real Madrid's thirty-meter line seemed to be a wall, forcefully blocking all of Barcelona's passes outside it. A closer look revealed that once