Marc Pubill: The Full-Back Simeone Turned Into a Centre-Back
Some players arrive at a club to fill a position. Others arrive and end up redefining what that position means altogether. Marc Pubill belongs to the second category. His story at Atlético de Madrid is not that of a transfer that worked out well. It is the story of a complete, silent, surgical transformation — one that says as much about the player as it does about the manager who orchestrated it.
When Atlético de Madrid closed the signing of Pubill from Almería in the summer of 2025, the objective was straightforward: cover the right flank of the defence, where Nahuel Molina was on his way out, and Marcos Llorente had grown increasingly uncomfortable in that role.
The Rojiblancos had first tried to sign Jesús Areso, but Athletic Club appeared at the last minute and snatched the Navarrese. Pubill was Plan B. What nobody imagined at the time was that Plan B would become one of the most intriguing pieces in the entire Atlético setup. That is how football works sometimes: the best moves don’t always come from the first intention.
The Profile: An Unusual Physique for a Full-Back
We are talking about a player who stands 1.90 metres tall, 22 years old, with remarkable physical presence for his age. Those dimensions are not standard for a modern right back, where the dominant model rewards pace and combination play over physical verticality. The archetypal full-back of today’s game is fast, technical, and capable of operating almost as a winger in the attacking phase.
Pubill has pace and technique, but his body has always spoken a different language: aerial duels won, deep covering runs, the balance between aggression and positioning. His is a profile that unsettles opponents in a different way — more physical, more direct. That morphological rarity, which in other contexts might have been a limitation — too big for the flank, not technical enough for certain styles — became his greatest asset at Atlético.
Atlético manager Diego Simeone does not look for standard full-backs: he looks for players who can take on multiple roles within the same system, who are reliable in a low block and in possession, in one-v-one situations, and in covering their teammates. And Pubill, with that physique and that footballing intelligence, fits that description better than anyone anticipated.
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The Tactical Reinvention
What happened next is the stuff of coaching textbooks. The transformation was gradual but decisive: Pubill started out as a right back, but Simeone began deploying him with increasing frequency as a centre-back, particularly in three-man defensive systems or in scenarios where the team needed greater physical presence at the heart of the defence.
It is not without precedent in modern football — Paolo Maldini started as a full-back, so did Gerard Piqué — but it is a decision that requires vision and mutual trust. Simeone had that vision. Pubill delivered. And the result has been one of the most striking positional reinventions in LaLiga in recent years.
Tactically, what makes this reinvention possible is his reading of the game in transition. When Atlético lose the ball, Pubill is not a full-back scrambling back to his position — he is already where he needs to be. That anticipation, that instinct for positioning before the opponent even makes their mistake, is what makes him viable — and dangerous — as a centre-back in a low block designed to spring quickly on the counter. In a team that defends as much with shape as with intensity, having a player who understands both is a luxury.
His numbers in interceptions back this up. This season, Pubill averages 1.1 interceptions per game, placing him among the top four defenders at the club in that category. Not a jaw-dropping figure in isolation, but it takes on a different weight when you consider he is achieving it from a position that was not his own just months ago.
The Journey: From Terrassa to the Metropolitano
Formed in the academy of Gimnàstic de Manresa, Pubill moved to Levante in his youth years and made his Primera División debut on 20 December 2021, aged just 18. An early debut that could have accelerated expectations and pressure, but which, in his case, served as a hardening process away from excessive spotlight. The Levante of that era was not a media showcase — it was a trench. And for a young defender, that has a formative value no statistic can capture.
Then came Almería, where across two seasons he played 63 matches, scored 2 goals, and registered 8 assists. Modest numbers for a full-back in attacking terms, but they do not tell the most important part of the story: the defensive maturity he built in an environment of maximum pressure, first in the top flight and then in the second division, where football is more physical, more direct, and far less forgiving of positional errors.
Playing for a team fighting to survive teaches you things no big club ever can. It teaches you to defend when you are alone. It teaches you to concentrate for 90 minutes even when the match is lost. It teaches you that football, in its purest form, is a sport of endurance. The step up to international football came through the Under-21s, where he established himself as the undisputed owner of the right channel: he played all four matches at the European Championship and scored against Slovakia.
But his most compelling calling card was the Olympic gold in Paris 2024, where he featured in five of the six matches, including the final against the host nation, France. Winning an Olympic gold at 20, in a final against the home country, builds a kind of composure that no training session can replicate. It is experience earned in moments that truly matter. And that shows on the pitch.
What Simeone Says Without Saying It
There is a very specific way Simeone shows trust in a player: he plays him in the matches that hurt the most. Not the comfortable ones, not the routine ones. The ones that decide everything. And Pubill has been there. In the Champions League, in the Madrid derbies, in the matches where Atlético’s defensive system could not afford a single crack. That sustained presence, in a squad with such fierce internal competition, is the most reliable signal that the manager sees something in him that goes beyond tactical utility.
Above all, Simeone sees a player he can trust when the pressure is at its highest. Pubill’s own words about the Argentine manager say it best: “He has changed my life.” Not a line rehearsed for a press conference. The acknowledgement of a player who knows exactly what has happened to him this year, and who was responsible for it.
What Comes Next
The story of Marc Pubill over the past twelve months is one worth studying. He arrived as the market’s second choice, coming from the second division, and within months became a fixture in the defensive unit of one of the most demanding clubs in Europe under Diego Simeone.
It’s why, having previously represented Spain at the U19, U21, and U23 level, Pubill has finally made the step up to the senior team. He made his La Roja debut on June 3, coming on for Jon Martin in a friendly vs. Iraq, and he’ll be looking to make his mark on the world’s biggest stage in this summer’s FIFA World Cup.
At 22 years old, Pubill is only just getting started, but what he has already shown is enough to ask an uncomfortable question: how many full-backs in the world would have withstood this reinvention — in position, in competitive level, in tactical demands — without losing either performance or identity? Very few. And in elite football, that is not a minor detail. It is precisely what separates good players from special ones. Pubill, quietly, has crossed that line.
By: Juanjo Montero / @JJMont3ro
Featured Image: @GabFoligno / Europa Press Sports