I remember the phone call.

Everything began with the sports editor of this paper asking what there was to say which would give his readers a fresh perspective on the Ballon D'Or award in 2011.

I knew that, in just under a decade after moving to live in Spain, I had seen a quality of football which smashed the Richter Scale and that while Lionel Messi was a genius and Pep Guardiola was this orchestra's Andre Previn, one man absolutely required recognition. Xavi Hernández is what Messi is aiming at. If Messi can pack, pound for pound, the level of quality which Xavi has shown into his own career then he will stand alone as the world's greatest footballer.

I knew, when commissioned, that Messi would win the Ballon D'Or – in fact I bet on it. But when I wrote that love letter to Xavi's career I knew that his work merited the homage. I did not, however, know that BackPage Press would spot the piece, admire it and commission an entire book, an edited extract of which is published here, and which is now being read across the globe simply because they, like me, believe that the written version of wearing your heart on your sleeve is important when the subject merits it. Thanks to the Sunday Herald for initiating the newsprint version of these remarkable events - thanks to Xavi and Guardiola and Messi and FC Barcelona for everything else.

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IT is just outside the FC Barcelona dressing-room door at Wembley, about an hour after Manchester United have been defeated 3-1 in the 2011 Champions League final. The dancing, singing and beer drinking in the Catalan quarters have only just died down. I've been charged with interviewing two of the winning players, with the trophy, for the final Champions League weekly television programme of the season and there is now a desperate need for a player to emerge from the fiesta, never mind agree to the damn request.

The producer has a spare dressing room set up and ready to go. Our guests can't be the man of the match or one of the goalscorers, who have already had to give interviews after showing the cup off to the Barça fans.

Gerard Piqué, tired and hefting a big cardboard box full of I don't know what (it wasn't the goal net which he cut down to keep as a souvenir, because I asked that one) agrees to a nice piece to camera – enjoying being with the cup for a moment. We have been allocated a neighbouring, empty dressing room, and it's a weird moment – the trophy, a Champions League winner I first met when he was still a kid in the cantera and an empty, clean, atmosphere-free changing room – but his joy radiates like a cloud. However, while he is filmed, all the other players skip past, leaving just one – Xavi Hernández.

"Five minutes Xavi, not a second more," is my pitch as the two ranks of television reporters about 50 feet away growl and will him to say "No", so that they can get their last hit of a glorious night. Also, he knows that everyone else is waiting for him. Not only is a big party at the Natural History Museum in South Kensington waiting for him, but the last one on the coach, especially if the rest have been held up, will know all about it.

"OK, I know you're good to your word, let's do it." Joy.

We sprint down the corridor, relieve the Uefa official of the trophy he's quite legitimately removing in the belief that the second interview has as much chance of arriving as a Christmas card from José Mourinho, knock off a quick piece and prepare to rush the great man to the sanctuary of the bus. For no better reason than residual excitement, I mention to him, as we trot out of the dressing room, "I thought Messi's movement across your run was outstanding and it opened up Pedro's space for your assist pass". (Take a look on YouTube. Xavi's forward run has him poised like a quarterback on the move; Pedro has Nemanja Vidic tight on him, but as Messi goes towards Xavi's run, Patrice Evra follows him, Pedro backs off into the vacated space, Xavi finds the pass and his team-mate finishes, bottom corner). Which is enough to make him stop dead and say: "Man, I love the way you enjoy your football," and then walk me through Barça's first goal.

It was magical, just a fractional glimpse of what we all miss out on – reporters, fans, officials, sponsors – when the winning players stop to dissect and enjoy what it is they have just done.

As for Xavi, it was typical that he was compelled to stop and talk about football. He's as good at analysing it as he is playing it – which is why so many believe he'll become Barça coach. It wouldn't be the first time he has followed in Pep Guardiola's footsteps.

Football is full of little ironies and quirks of fate. Consider this: When Xavi was establishing himself in the Barcelona first team, the chance to join Manchester United came up. He thought long and hard about it, but decided to dig in and fight for his chance at the club he has always supported.

Just imagine Xavi supplying his laser-guided passes to Andy Cole, Dwight Yorke, Ruud van Nistelrooy, Wayne Rooney or Ole Gunnar Solskjær.

Xavi is now the venerated, brilliant, visionary, all-time great Spanish midfielder but, between 1998 and 2002, he was an under-rated, misused and unfairly judged young player. Ironically, his first problem was Pep Guardiola.

Xavi followed up his Barça debut against Southampton in the summer tour of 1998 with a compet-itive debut, under Louis van Gaal, in the Spanish Supercup that August. His chance came because Guardiola and Albert Celades were both injured. Xavi had been on holiday, lying on the beach, only to get the urgent call to take a flight back to Barcelona that afternoon. Destiny calling.

The Supercup first leg was a horrible defeat at Mallorca, but Xavi scored and received rave notices. Guardiola was one of the quickest to praise his "awareness" and "maturity" but promised to make it hard for Xavi to take his place. He would deliver on that promise.

All of this happened as Van Gaal's team stumbled without a single victory, competitive or friendly, from April 19 the previous season until they defeated Rafa Benítez's Extremadura on September 13. Things weren't going well for Spain's champions. By mid-September, Xavi made his Champions League debut, at Old Trafford in a frenetic 3-3 draw against a United side which would win the treble that season. His first La Liga start came in an imperious 3-1 win at Valencia the following month.

By this time, he seemed established as not only a canterano (youth team product) of major promise but a first-team regular. That season, he played every Champions League group game and made 27 appearances in all competitions – the 10th most-used footballer in Van Gaal's squad. However, Guardiola's return to full fitness from another calf injury, just before the halfway stage of La Liga, resulted in fewer appearances for Xavi.

It is no disaster for an 18-year-old to be relegated by Phillip Cocu, Luis Enrique, Rivaldo, Ronald de Boer, Pep Guardiola and Geovanni, particularly when you score a goal that is vital in the successful defence of the championship. Xavi's strike at Valladolid brought victory in a poor display and sparked a run of one defeat in the next 16 matches until the title was retained. "Of course, when I scored in Valladolid, I was really saving Van Gaal's bacon," he recalls. "He had so many detractors at the time, people wanting him kicked out of the club. That goal was the catalyst for us then going on to win the league".

The following year Xavi, with Marchena, Joan Capdevila and Carles Puyol, steered a wonderful Spain squad to the final of the Sydney Olympics tournament; he scored in the final, a 2-2 draw with Cameroon, and tucked away his penalty in the shoot-out, only to lose to opponents inspired by Samuel Eto'o. So, in those two breakthrough years, Xavi won the Spanish title, the Fifa Youth World Cup and picked up an Olympic silver medal; a Catalan, schooled in the Barça cantera, evidently gifted and a high achiever. Life should have been sweeter than Turkish Delight dipped in Nutella.

Yet the Camp Nou not only didn't take him to its heart immediately, he remembers hearing its disapproval if he came on as a substitute for Guardiola, reading fans' letters to papers, hearing them on radio phone-ins, objecting to the young pretender trying to "oust" King Pep from territory that was rightfully his. The club's managing director, Javier Pérez Farguell, had briefed at least one agent that Barça were "open minded" to the idea of selling Xavi – largely because he didn't have "great marketing cachet". Iniesta they liked. Iniesta was untouchable. But Xavi, well -

"People initially drew constant comparisons between me and Guardiola – I struggled to shake that off," Xavi admitted when he celebrated his 10th anniversary in the first team in 2008. "To be valued and respected for the way I play was a real battle, especially when Van Gaal used us in the same position and compared the two of us at press conferences. It was hard having to compete against my idol. I worried about robbing him of his place, about whether we would get on or not. I idealised everything about Pep – how he talked, his leadership on the pitch. So, psychologically, it wasn't a great beginning, despite the fact that in terms of my own football, I felt great. But either you're man enough to meet the challenge or you have no place in this club.

"For a long chunk of my career, when it looked like I was the successor to Pep in midfield, I was made to feel like an outsider – a bad guy for taking over from the legendary captain. As a player, I needed him to go, but then I loved it when he came back to take over as manager. We've always got on well, despite the fact that we had been set up as rivals. Pep gave me advice and tried to help the situation. Now I know exactly what he expects of me, because he's so good at explaining things. It's all worked out in his head and he communicates his ideas brilliantly.

"I'm a culé – this is my club. I'm in the third Champions League final of this Barcelona generation and I wouldn't swap anything that I missed for what I've had here."

Xavi's decision to stay has seen him become the most gifted, consistent and visionary player Spain has produced. The stats help make that argument – six league titles and three Champions Leagues with Barça, Euro 2008 winner, a world champion with Spain's Under-19s and with the senior team in 2010. He's also the club's all-time appearance holder and has more than 100 caps – some feat at only 31.

However, it is his complete package of vision, style, steel, technique and will to win which makes him stand alone in Spanish history.

Graham Hunter will be at The Arches at noon on Saturday, February 25. Tickets, £3, from www.thearches.co.uk or 0141 565 1000. For details of this event and others in Glasgow and Aberdeen, check out the blog at www.backpagepress.co.uk Barca: The Making of the Greatest Team in the World is available in ebook and paperback.