He’s An Enabler, We All Love Enablers
For the Welsh side, in 35 games he found the net just…actually, hang on, he never scored at all during his time playing for Cardiff, did he? Indeed, in 268 career games, the goal count from him stands at a modest 23. Medel does have forward momentum, he will get forward to support and can provide assists, but he rarely sticks the ball in the net himself. Of course, to be fair, his style has never suggested that is an integral part of his game.
One of his greatest skills is being the tin foil hat for the covering full-backs. He is essentially a canny defender with technical ambition and a big heart. The footballing equivalent of a pirate, in many ways, when you think about it – buccaneering into uncharted territories with the proverbial bit between his teeth, looting you of your possessions. With Cardiff quite regularly under the cosh, in their single, largely disappointing, season in the Premier League, the Bluebirds regularly found themselves over-stretched. In the end, you had to lose count of the number of times Medel was across to snuff out danger as harassed defenders found themselves wrong-footed or in no man’s land. Medel remains one of the best first line defensive players in the business. Plus, he has a rather precise passing sensibility which makes him very reliable when it comes to set-up play.
