Xabi Alonso just always had time on the ball. There was an unsettling sense of calm about him. And he kept that up from the time he was a young and belligerent Spaniard to the time he was winning the World Cup, the Euro Cups and the Champions League with Bayern Munich. He's done it all.
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He relished his role as a deep-lying playmaker and he was as deadly with his thunderous strikes as he was with his precision passing. Those diagonals, OhmyGod!
Alonso was a menacing presence in the Premier league when it was the best league in the world. At the height of the the El Clasico rivalry, Xabi Alonso was pulling the strings in the Madrid midfield. When tiki-taka took over the world, he was running oppositions ragged with neat exchanges with some of the best in the world.
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Xabi Alonso exudes class and will undoubtedly go down in history as one of the greatest midfielders of the modern era.
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About the author
Shambhu Ajith
Shambhu is a European and international football journalist at Sportskeeda who focuses on previews, listicles and news articles. An ardent Manchester United supporter since before his teenage years, he started following the Red Devils by age 10 watching MUTV on television. Shambhu is also a highly-revered rapper and a playback singer on Spotify, having a whopping 1 million monthly listeners.
For his articles, Shambhu believes in triple-checking every piece of information, relying on trusted websites like Transfermarkt and Opta, and staying away from speculative publications. He believes that his law degree helped him to be more articulate and meticulous with his content and one of his core strengths is seamlessly involving emotion in his write-ups owing to the love for the sport. For Sportskeeda, has done exclusive interviews with Spanish legends Gaizka Mendieta and Fernando Morientes so far, and his articles boast of a huge readership of close to 50 million.
Shambhu's favorite footballer is Lionel Messi, and the Argentine attaining glory in 2022 is his favorite FIFA World Cup moment. He believes only Kylian Mbappe and Erling Haaland could replicate Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo's rivalry in the years to come. His favorite manager is Sir Alex Ferguson due to the Scot's unmatched longevity at the top.