Fabian Balbuena has admitted that his confidence took a big hit as he struggled for gametime at West Ham last season.
The Paraguayan defender was restricted to just 17 appearances in the Premier League having previously established himself as a first-choice centre half under Manuel Pellegrini.
The Chilean’s departure coincided with Balbuena starting just three games for David Moyes in the protracted second half of the 2019/20 campaign and just one of those came after lockdown and the resumption of the season.
He wasn’t in the starting lineup either for the first two games of the 2020/21 season either despite Moyes switching to a five at the back formation for the second match against Arsenal.
Balbuena’s minutes were coming in the Carabao Cup but after Issa Diop tested positive for covid-19 prior to the third round match against Hull City, Balbuena started and played 90 minutes in the following four matches.
Taking advantage of the absence of Diop, you’d be hard pushed to drop the defender for the Frenchman should Moyed think about making a change. Moyes kept faith with Balbuena for the 3-3 draw with Spurs on Sunday despite Diop’s return to fitness.
Balbuena hasn’t shown the form that made him look like a £4million bargain from Corinthians in 2018 but he’s at least on the road to recovering some semblance of form after a tough last 12 months.
“When you don’t play, you feel a little bit without confidence but that is normal because every player wants to play,” the defender said.
“We know that only eleven can start and then you have to wait for your opportunity, which I did, working every day and never giving up, doing my best so that when I got my opportunity I was able to take it as I did.”
It was a rough start on Sunday for Balbuena, who had travelled 15,000 miles on aeroplanes to take part in the international break World Cup qualifiers for his country against Peru and Venezuela.
The 30-year-old made a poor decision to show Son Heung-min inside on his stronger foot to lash past Lukasz Fabianski to give the hosts the lead inside 45 seconds. After the 16th minute when the visitors went 3-0 down, Balbuena, like his teammates, upped their game and pulled off an astonishing comeback to earn a point.
It was he that got the ball rolling on 82 minutes when he planted a powerful header past Hugo Lloris from Aaron Cresswell’s free kick to net what, at the time, looked like a consolation goal.
“The first half I felt it, which is normal, because I had travelled a long way and I think I did almost 20 hours flying,” Balbuena admitted.
“My body felt that a little bit, but when I am inside the pitch I will always try to do my best and to help the boys and I think all the guys did a good job and, as I say, we are doing really, really good work during the week and trying to push each other to do our best even in training, because we know if you train well, when you go to the pitch you will have a good chance to get the results.”
