It's not a skill you see all too often in modern football, but when done right it's one of the most joyous sights in the sport: the ball roll around the goalkeeper when one-on-one. Fewer finishes stamp the forward's complete authority over a goalkeeper than the ball roll -- in the nonchalance and the skill lies pure arrogance of the best kind. In this day of xG and multi-angle multi-statistics analysis, it's a risky option, though. It's even riskier when you're playing for David vs Goliath.
Osasuna vs Barcelona was always going to be David vs Goliath: a club that's oscillated between the second and first divisions constantly throughout its history vs the Barcelona and nothing about their current form suggested that it would be otherwise this Saturday night.
So, when Bryan Zaragoza was played in one-on-one with Inaki Pena thanks to a sensational, curving through ball form Pablo Ibanez with Osasuna up 1-0, you'd expect him to do the sensible thing, mitigate risk, choose the side foot finish and make it a comfortable 2-0. The thing is, though, Bryan Zaragoze doesn't do risk mitigation.
5'5" and with the boundless energy of a dynamo Zaragoza is chaos unleashed on a football field. His affinity for a dribble harkens back to the days of the streetwise ballers, the ball here one moment, taken away in another... and it's one that was on show on Saturday. He'd already set up that first goal, twisting Jules Kounde hither and thither before swinging in a delicious cross for Ante Budimir to head home powerfully, but it was when he was sent through that it came into full focus again.
Having cleverly ran into space inside Kounde, he took one touch to push it past Sergi Dominguez, shaped to shoot far post but with the second rolled the ball past Pena -- who had bought the dummy completely and was sprawling to the left for the save even as Zaragoza went the other way -- and calmly tucked it into an empty net.
In one smooth motion, Zaragoza had made it 2-0 but the nature of the goal meant it felt like even more. It seemed to say, 'yes, we're that good and no, there's nothing you can do about it' Osasuna don't condescend against Barcelona, but here we were.
Bryan, what have you done?!?!#LetsGoRojillos | #OsasunaBarça
- C. A. OSASUNA (@osasuna_en) September 28, 2024
Zaragoza has previous with this too -- last October while playing for Granada, he scored two superb goals to hold Barca to a 2-2 draw. In fact, he almost won it that day with a superb shot towards the end that cannoned off the woodwork.
It was at Granada that Zaragoza had first broken through. Told many times that he would not make it as a professional, rejected by academies from across Spain -- from hometown Malaga, Sevilla, Real Betis to Real Valladolid -- he'd got his first break when Granada's academy took him in. Soon he graduated to the senior team and was playing a key role in their promotion to LaLiga. His work in the first division (especially that display against Barcelona) caught the eye, and in December, Bayern Munich came calling. Now on loan at Osasuna, the 23-year-old is showing once again why he's such an exciting footballer.
Osasuna would go on to score two more, and although an incredible Lamine Yamal goal helped reduced the deficit, the 4-2 scoreline was as emphatic as it looked... Zaragoza's goal exemplifying the football the Basque side played through the night. Fun, fast, direct.
For that, Bryan Zaragoza takes our Moment of the Week.