Barcelona’s official YouTube channel<\/a> for a frank question-and-answer session, and he wasted no time in expressing his admiration for new arrival Karim Adeyemi.<\/p>\nBalde spoke with striking confidence: “It hasn’t been long since he joined us, but I’ve spoken with him a lot during this short period. I think we’ve built a good relationship, he seems a calm person, he’ll help us a lot during the season, and I’m sure he will, he’s very fast, I’ve known him for a while, and I’ve admired his speed.”<\/p>\n
Praise for his new team-mate was only the start. Balde also laid out his personal ambitions for the new season: “On an individual level, I want to keep developing and learning. I’m a young player and I have plenty of room to improve.”\u00a0<\/p>\n
He went on: “These are my main goals. As for the team, I want to continue on this path we’re following, and even improve it, and if we win more titles, that would be far better.”<\/p>\n
The full-back turned to the atmosphere inside Barcelona’s dressing room. He praised Brazil’s Raphinha for the way he embraces the young players, then named his inner circle: “My closest friends in the dressing room are Casad\u00f3, Lamine, H\u00e9ctor, Gavi, Ronald, and Ara\u00fajo. I don’t want to leave anyone out.”<\/p>\n
Asked about the finest match of his career, Balde didn’t hesitate. He picked an unforgettable Cl\u00e1sico: “The Cl\u00e1sico with Xavi, when Kessi\u00e9 scored. We won in the last minute, and I managed to create the goal for Kessi\u00e9.” His best goal in a Barcelona shirt? The strike in the Super Cup final against Real Madrid.<\/p>\n
A surprising choice rounded off his remarks. On his idol, Balde said: “My childhood idol was always Samuel Eto’o,” before adding: “As for a left-back, my idol is Jordi Alba, whom I consider the best left-back in Barcelona’s history.”<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Barcelona fans are still waiting for their first glimpse of the new-look side in pre-season, but young star…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":62644,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[25002,92,23899,85],"class_list":["post-62643","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-barcelona","tag-a-balde","tag-barcelona","tag-k-adeyemi","tag-laliga"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62643","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=62643"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/62643\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/62644"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=62643"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=62643"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/spain\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=62643"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}