Camp Nou filled with tears as Gerard Pique departs

Sergio Busquets is already the last of the Mohicans. The only survivor of the best Barça team in history. From the Barça of the sextuple. Of Pep Guardiola's Barca that amazed the world with their football. And their success with it. The veteran midfielder has been left alone after the sudden and unexpected departure of Piqué. Busquets will also leave when he ends his contract on June 30. And an unforgettable and unrepeatable time will be over. Forever. The inexorable passing of time is relentless. Even for the greatest heroes. Piqué has been a victim of this decline. As before, was Iniesta. Or Xavi himself. The current Blaugrana coach suffered in his own flesh this decline that forced him to leave the club when Luis Enrique sentenced him to the bench. It is the law of life.

This Saturday Piqué played his last game at the Camp Nou. He leaves Barça for sporting and economic reasons. Xavi doesn't count on him. He has made it clear to him that he is the sixth centre-back. Laporta singles him out for his exorbitant salary. Both have pushed him towards the exit door. And Piqué has finally decided to step aside. Some will think that he has taken too long. That he has been on the scene of the crime of the club's European failures for too many years. Maybe. But we must also remember that he has been, along with Puyol, one of the best central defenders of all time. And that he deserved a farewell worthy of a legend. He had it: he started his 616th match in the Blaugrana shirt. And he wore the captain's armband and played along with his friends Busquets and Jordi Alba, in a concession by the coach to nostalgia.

Piqué received a simple but emotional tribute. Barça's victory against Almería. A victory that momentarily places the Blaugrana as leaders of La Liga, waiting for what Madrid does on Monday at Vallecas in the derby. Barça were tremendously superior to the Andalusians, but it was difficult for them to find their way to the goal. They wasted many opportunities in the first half (including a penalty that Lewandowski shot wide in a bizarre way), until just after the start of the second period Dembélé invented a great move and opened the scoring. From then on, everything was placid until Piqué's substitution came. And then the excitement, inevitably, boiled over. The Camp Nou was flooded with tears. Those of Piqué and those of all the culés. Because a legend was leaving. Goodbye Gerard!