Born in 1995, Alejandro ,,Álex´´ Grimaldo started his football career in 2006 at his hometown club Valencia CF and joined FC Barcelona’s youth 2 years later, aged 13. 2 Years, 11 months and 15 days later, aged 15, he played and started his first professional game of his career for Barcelona B while still playing for Juvenil A.

In the 2012-2013 he got promoted to Barcelona B, alongside Banuz, Ayala, Patric, Miguel Angel, Quintillà (Jordi, Xavi Quintillà’s brother) and Dongou. All of them, except Dongou, left Barcelona B to other clubs. Exactly 2 months later, Grimaldo fulfilled another dream others can only dream of, his debut in the Camp Nou.

Tito Vilanova saw his special talent already at the early stage of his coaching career and started him on the bench in the Joan Gamper Trophy against Sampdoria in 2012. In the late stage of the game number 28 was ready to come on, replacing Carles Planas.

After this huge motivation Grimaldo started his 2012-13 season, his first full season for Barcelona B before his injury, playing 24 games and getting 1957 minutes out of 2160. He missed the game against Alcorcón because of a knee injury and 9 games later he suffered his first huge step down while climbing up to the first team as he teared his anterior cruciate ligament (ACL) on 23 February 2013 missing the rest of the campaign plus the next season until February. While still being injured, Grimaldo renewed his contract on the 10th of January 2014 until 2016 with an option for another year.

On the 2nd of February 2014, more than a year later he gave his comeback against Zaragoza after replacing ,,Man Of The Match´´ Adama Traoré in the 90th minute. 3 days later after his come back with Barcelona B he debuted with Spain U21 against Barcelona, at the age of only 17.

Barcelona B finished the campaign at the third place with 66 points (Eibar, who were 1st had 71 points) and after a good display, Grimaldo started the preseason with the first team under new coach Luis Enrique, alongside Patric, Bagnack, Diagne, Samper, Halilovic, Munir, Sandro, Nieto, Joan Román, Dongou and Adama.

During Preseason, Grimaldo started the first game against Recreativo (0-1 win), then against Nice, he started on the bench and got subbed in for Alba in the 61th minute. Against Napoli he again started on the bench for the first team, and got subbed in for Alba in the 60th minute, as well against HJK Helsinki.

On the 18th of August 2014 he got another game at the Camp Nou, after replacing Alba in the 76th minute against Club Leon.

After a full preseason with the first team, Grimaldo was also registered for the Champions League ‘B’ list, but did not play or even get called up.

During the 2014-15 campaign Eusebio started to struggle as his individual tactics didn’t work anymore and after 4 years at Barcelona B, he got replaced by Jordi Vinyals after the demanding of Josep Maria Bartomeu. La Masia director Jordi Roura wanted youth coach García Pimienta to overtake as the coach until the end of the season. However, Jordi Vinyals was appointed and he won 2 games out of 18 (12 losses, 4 draws) and Barcelona B got relegated. A horror season for the reserve team and during that horror season, Grimaldo was the point of light and the most consistent Barcelona B player, who deserved promotion the most, alongside Sergi Samper and Adama Traoré.

And while everyone was sure, that Samper and Grimaldo are going to get promoted, Luis Enrique did not count on both wonderkids and promoted no-one to the first team.

After the season ended, Gabri, the assistant of Vinyals started the preseason until Gerard López was appointed, after Bartomeu demanded it, the same thing that happened with Vinyals earlier.

Grimaldo, on eof the most experienced players in the team, was appointed as the first captain.

“My role as a captain? Together with coaches, I have to support the younger players who haven’t experienced certain situations yet.” [vavel]

During Barcelona B’s preseason, the team was unbeaten but struggled against higher teams (Llagostera, Manlleu (4th division)) to score goals. And during the first stage of season, the same struggle continues. (8 goals in 12 games, 1 of them an own goal). The defence this season is good, when the opponent has chances then Ortolá mostly saves them and the team several times a game. Gerard López and his assistant coach García Pimienta also fixed the problem with the corners as last year the corners were like penalties for the opponent.

So far Barcelona B is 15th in the Segunda Division B, with 13 points in 12 games.

After the 1-0 home win against Alcoyano, Grimaldo was asked about the contact with Luis Enrique, as he said that he has no contact with the first team coach. Adama, who was sold to Aston Villa with a buyback option and Halilovic, who is on loan to Gijon said the same thing about Luis Enrique, but no one said about them that he has “attitude problems”, like Grimaldo has them apparently, which is not true.

Grimaldo justifies himself on Twitter: “I feel that you have misunderstood my words, I just want to work hard to grow in the club that helps me grow as a footballer and as a person. As always I will give my all to help #FCB in everything. Visca el Barça!”

Last summer, Barcelona wanted to loan out Grimaldo on the last day of the transfer period, without talking to the player about the move (Gerard Romero).

Grimaldo’s dream was always to succeed at Barcelona, but he sees that he has no future at the club, as Luis Enrique clearly prefers Mathieu (32) and Adriano (31) over him. Adriano, who’s not helping the team anymore since 2012-13, who is injury prone and not on Barcelona standard and Mathieu, a player who’s shaky with the ball on his feet and is already 32 years old. Jordi Alba, who is not the fittest, could always get injured and those two are his replacements.

Since October 2014 Grimaldo wasn’t called up for the first team training anymore, which is why he refused to go on loan to Levante, I think, alongside the fact that the club did not talked with him about their last-minute idea. Grimaldo and everyone who’s watching Barcelona B and following them, clearly knows that under Luis Enrique he won’t have a future at Barcelona. Benfica is chasing for the wonderkid, who can play as a winger and as a central-midfielder too, for the last 2 seasons and they may up snatching him for free this summer.

Grimaldo is the Dani Alves on the left side. A playmaking full-back who is a good dribbler, with a good shooting and passing technique, who can combine very well with his team-mates, a threat in the final third and he’s far from the end-product and will only get better with a good coach, and a team that cares about developing.

If he leaves, which is more than likely, then we won’t have a similiar full-back type like him. Dani Alves is 32 years old and won’t stay for long at Barcelona anymore, Mathieu and Alba are not playmaking full-backs and are not a threat in the final third, Aleix Vidal is a winger converted into a FB and only played as a RB for 6 games, also not a playmaking FB, Sergi Roberto isn’t either. Adriano is deadwood.

Marc Cucurella (Juvenil A, will get promoted next season) is more an Alba-type of full-back. His departure will weaken our team a lot and we will continue our way – acting when it’s too late – Puyol Xavi Adriano Alves.

UPDATE: Grimaldo on RAC1: “I hope that my situation will change and I can continue here for more years. I don’t have a deal with another club. I want to stay here. The club can extend my contract for one more year, but they haven’t told me anything yet.”