Barcelona are led by five captains. Why isn’t Rodri one of them?

When Barcelona knew they had the option to sign Rodri this summer, Hansi Flick was won over by two things: his world-class quality as a Ballon d’Or, Champions League and World Cup winner — and his leadership skills.

Barca’s midfield was already looking strong, and the plan for the window just ended was actually to further strengthen in attack, but Flick had also wanted to add more experience across the board.

Under the German over the past two seasons, Barca have married exciting attacking football with regular success — but the team is unusually youthful. For their La Liga home match against Athletic Club on August 27, for example, the average age of their starting XI was 23.18.

Despite this, Rodri, who is vastly experienced at 30 and wore the armband as Spain won the World Cup in July, is not one of the club’s five captains for this season.

Traditionally, these are chosen by a vote among the players — a process that has been followed at the Catalan club since Pep Guardiola’s time as their manager from 2008-12.

The captaincy carries weight at Barcelona. It is not just about having a piece of fabric wrapped around your bicep during matches.

Captains are expected to represent the rest of the dressing room, speak on behalf of their team-mates and embody the club in public. And as detailed above, unlike at many places in the game, the players themselves have a big say in deciding who those figures should be.

Last season, in order from first to fifth in the voting, Barca’s captains were: Ronald Araujo, Marc-Andre ter Stegen, Frenkie de Jong, Raphinha and Pedri.

This season, however, marks something of a break from tradition.

Flick decided he would personally appoint a main captain and first vice-captain — Raphinha and Pedri were his choices. The other three vice-captains were then voted in by the group: Eric Garcia received the most, followed by De Jong and Lamine Yamal.

It may come as a surprise that 19-year-old Yamal is on the list rather than the man who captained him, Garcia and Pedri (plus fellow Barca players Dani Olmo, Joan Garcia, Pau Cubarsi and Gavi) to World Cup glory less than two months ago.

But the vote is heavily influenced by seniority; not overall, but in the amount of time players have been with Barcelona. In this context, it would not be considered unusual for a recent arrival — Rodri was signed, in a deal worth up to €76.5million (£65.3m; $87.8m), from Manchester City in the middle of August — to be omitted.

This does not mean that Rodri is not expected to be an influential figure in the dressing room — something that comes naturally to him — over the coming months.

“We’re pleased to have Rodri in our team,” Flick said in his press conference after the Valencia game last Sunday in which the newcomer made his first Barca start. “You can also see everything he does with the ball, everything he does on the pitch. It makes sense. He gives the team structure in attack with the ball, but also without it.”

Rodri’s full impact on the pitch has yet to be seen, as Barcelona have not been truly tested by any of their first six opponents this season. His reading of the game and his superb long passes have been on display, but his remarkable composure in really tight matches has not yet been needed.

But over 12 days next month, they make trips to Galatasaray, Real Betis and Paris Saint-Germain then host Real Madrid in El Clasico on October 25. That fixture will put the other significant side of Rodri’s signing into special focus: the fact he chose Barca over rival interest from Jose Mourinho’s side.

Rodri made his Barca debut from the bench against Athletic Club on August 27 and has since broken into the starting line-up (David Ramos/Getty Images)

Despite having been with the team for only a short time, Rodri has already taken on a senior role in the dressing room. Some thought his arrival would hurt the status of Marc Bernal, a 19-year-old defensive midfielder many fans see as the team’s future in that position.

Rodri is instead viewed around the club as a mentor to Bernal. In Wednesday’s 5-1 Champions League defeat of Feyenoord, and Sunday’s 4-2 win at Levante, Bernal came on  for Pedri with around 30 minutes to play, partnering Rodri in midfield.

And a controversial moment last week saw Rodri’s leadership qualities in action.

After they were taken off just past the hour in that eventual 5-0 win at Valencia, Movistar TV caught him saying to Cubarsi: “They’re really weak, they haven’t got past the halfway line.”

It was a private conversation between team-mates on the bench. In the Premier League, where he’s spent the past seven seasons with City, there aren’t many people tracking what players say when they think they are off-camera, but in Spain it’s commonplace.

As soon as Rodri found out it had been broadcast, he rang Valencia captain Jose Gaya to say sorry, and apologised publicly in the mixed zone following the Feyenoord game three days later.

The midfielder does not need an armband to become one of Barcelona’s important voices. He arrived at Camp Nou with the status of a player who has already captained Spain to the sport’s greatest honour and performed at its highest level for years. What he does not yet have at Barca is history.

That matters in a club where captaincy is as much about what happens inside the dressing room as events on the pitch. Yamal may still be a teenager, but he has been part of this group for three seasons. Rodri has been part of it for less than a month.

That gap will close with time.

Whether it eventually leads to another armband is a different question, but Rodri himself and many others around him already consider the newcomer a leader.