This article is part of Football FanCast's The Chalkboard series, which provides a tactical insight into teams, players, managers, potential signings and more...

Barcelona are currently far from their brilliant best. The Catalans are struggling for form as of late and Ernesto Valverde will have to find a way to get them back to winning ways. But even though he is also going through some turbulent times, Sergio Busquets seems more important to the Blaugrana than ever.

On the chalkboard

On the surface, Barcelona are still far from any sort of crisis.

After all, we're talking about a team that's currently sitting top of La Liga with a game in hand and also top of their Champions League group with two games to go.

Watch Spanish Football Live Streams With StreamFootball.tv Below

But their performances are lacking and a result, they have suffered a defeat and a disappointing draw in their last two outings.

And even though Busquets is already 31 years of age and his displays have also seen a dip, stats do suggest he's still very much a key figure at the club.

Blaugrana's linchpin

This season has already shown us that Busquets is slowly but surely not only getting past his prime but also getting a much smaller role in the squad as a whole.

Ernesto Valverde opted to drop the experienced Spaniard three times already and has only left him on the pitch for the full 90 minutes five out of 13 games in total.

But whenever Busquets wasn't present, Barcelona were that much worse for it.

Watch Lionel Messi and Gareth Bale answer the internet's weirdest questions in the video below...

A clear sign is in the win percentage - 73% and no losses with him, and just 25% and three losses without him.

And as worrying as that might be, it's not nearly the only thing.

One recent study by El Dia Despues crunched the numbers even more and came out with some fascinating results.

It turns out that Barcelona's opposition have more shots when Busquets is not in the team and the Catalans have fewer passes and fewer interceptions as well.

Not only that but when the 31-year-old is present, the team deploy more passes per minute and have more passes in the final third too along with more shots.

By all means, even though he is slowly but surely getting on and riding towards the sunset, Busquets seems every bit of an important player as he used to be back in the day.

Maybe it doesn't always seem that way on the pitch, but Blaugrana's pivot is still very much a key asset to the team.