The Catalan word ‘masia’ is usually translated as ‘farmhouse’ — and that’s not far wrong.
A better catch-all description might be a rural dwelling particular to the east of Spain, including Catalonia. When Camp Nou was being constructed in the late 1950s, architects working on Barcelona’s new ground turned a traditional old cottage close by into a convenient working space.
The house was built in 1702. Once the Camp Nou was completed, Barca decided to move their offices there. In 1979, it became the home of their youth academy, La Masia.
Youngsters who came from further afield were housed there and those who didn’t have family close by. Over the decades, dozens of Barca greats passed through, including Pep Guardiola, Carles Puyol, Victor Valdes and Andres Iniesta. Barca’s academy also produced Xavi and Lionel Messi, but they did not stay at La Masia (though they went there for meals with their team-mates every day after school).
In 2011, Barca moved their academy to a new building on the outskirts of the city. It is now part of their Ciutat Esportiva Joan Gamper complex in Sant Joan Despi, about 8km (5m) west of Camp Nou. But everyone still calls it La Masia.
Barcelona’s new youth academy residence building, pictured in 2021 (Pau Barrena/AFP via Getty Images)
This is where first-team stars Lamine Yamal and Pau Cubarsi live today: their beds are a 10-minute walk from where they train. The teenagers have both excelled for Barca this season.
Cubarsi made his La Liga debut in January two days before his 17th birthday and has not looked back. Yamal made his debut aged just 15 at the end of last season, before turning 16 in July. He’s since signed a major sponsorship deal with Adidas, and for many is the most exciting player to emerge at the club since Messi.
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In a recent CIES Football Observatory report, Barcelona were found to be using the highest percentage of under-20 players of any club in Europe’s top five leagues (15 per cent of their first-team squad).
A lot of credit for that needs to go to Xavi, a manager who’s trusted youth in a bold way since arriving in November 2021. He’s given 16 debuts to academy graduates in that time.
Yamal and Cubarsi are the stars of the show but others, including full-back Hector Fort (17) and striker Marc Guiu (18), have also impressed this term — and there are more on the way. Marc Bernal (16), Unai Hernandez (19), Quim Junyent (17), Pau Prim (18) and Guille Fernandez (15) are all expected to be around the first team in the coming seasons.
Xavi has shared great praise for the attitude of the youngsters coming through. He has labelled them “fearless” — describing this characteristic as the “main difference” from his generation.
On November 25, 2012, Barca had 11 La Masia graduates on the pitch (Xavi Torrent/Getty Images for The Times )
During the mismanagement, corruption scandals, financial turmoil and poor leadership that has dominated Barcelona in recent years, La Masia has always been their biggest asset. Not everyone at the club realised it. But they do now.
Aureli Altimira, a former La Masia director, puts this down to finances. “The biggest reason La Masia has shone in recent years is, mainly, due to the financial situation they are in,” he says.
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A senior Barca source — who, like all those cited here, preferred to speak anonymously to protect relationships — insists they see fully committing and trusting in the youth academy as their ticket to a route back to major future success, while admitting the club’s poor finances are indeed a factor.
“La Masia has shown throughout Barcelona’s history that it is the quickest and safest way to create ready-made players for the club — and it’s been forgotten sometimes,” they said.
“Given our financial state, and how good this generation is, we must take care of them.”
Everything starts with recruitment.
Altimira was in charge of La Masia from 2014 until 2021, alongside his colleague Jordi Roura (who also served as interim Barca boss in 2013). He says “spotting young talent and bringing them to work with Barca’s methodology as soon as possible” is of the utmost importance.
Barca’s network of scouts is one of the academy’s main strengths. They have traditionally signed many players from the local Catalonia region, but there are no restrictions on signing talent from further afield. Gavi and Fermin Lopez joined as young teenagers from Real Betis, for example.
Altimira says that, nowadays, practically every signing from any club around Spain involves an agent, whether the child is 10 or 17. Barca need to reach them, as well as the player’s family, and study who they are surrounded by.
La Masia sources told The Athletic the club “never loses its head — financially speaking — for any youngster”. They also described how they highlight “the educational side of the club, the prospect of living in La Masia in a healthy atmosphere” as positives in talks.
Every youngster signed is living the dream of most Catalan kids. They are the selected ones; the best of the best. When a Barca team visits any local club from a small village, no one in town wants to miss it. Those in charge at the academy are more than aware of the challenges this can bring.
A Barcelona youth player is interviewed at the club’s training ground in 2011 (Jasper Juinen/Getty Images)
“Kids have to deal with a lot of pressure during their years at La Masia,” says Altimira. “The academy has its own psychological services, designed to provide the kids with tools to deal with tough situations, how to handle scenarios such as breaking into a better team. How to behave in good moments and bad ones.
“The ones who stay and go through several age groups end up being stronger mentally. They know how tough it is — and they know our idea of playing by heart.”
Barca have an intense and sometimes heated rivalry with Espanyol at youth level. Their city rivals also have a revered academy and Catalan junior titles are often decided between the sides. Many players have joined Barca from Espanyol, including Marc Bartra, Marc Cucurella and Ilaix Moriba.
Competitiveness at youth level shapes the character of La Masia players and, as Altimira says, they are also taught to play in the same way as Barca’s first team. This is a very different approach to Real Madrid.
The football education Madrid’s youngsters receive is — as described by those who work at the academy — more oriented towards versatility, resilience and being able to adjust to several different tactical styles.
The goal is to train youngsters capable of making it in the professional game. But more often than not, that means them playing away from Madrid.
In a November 2023 study by the International Centre for Sports Studies, Real Madrid were found to be the club that had produced the greatest number of active players in Europe’s top five leagues, with 44. The nickname given to their youth academy, ‘La Fabrica’ (The Factory), has connotations of industrialised efficiency.
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In the 1980s, Madrid’s first team featured several players who graduated from their academy, but that is a thing of the past. Nowadays, the most common route involves leaving the club and being bought back later — the so-called ‘Via Carvajal’ (Carvajal route), detailed in The Athletic here.
At Barcelona, fans yearn to see La Masia graduates in the first team, and there is always an expectation on the club’s decision-makers to make sure youngsters are being given the chance.
November 25, 2012 perhaps represented the high point of Barca’s golden example of this connection. There were 11 youth products on the pitch in a La Liga match against Levante.
Victor Valdes, Martin Montoya (he came on for Dani Alves after 15 minutes), Carles Puyol, Gerard Pique, Jordi Alba, Sergio Busquets, Xavi, Cesc Fabregas, Pedro, Messi and Iniesta helped seal a 4-0 away victory in La Liga that day.
But one of the names in the line-up points us towards a different side of the story. Because in recent years, the path from academy to first team has not been so easy.
Cesc Fabregas left Barca for Arsenal as a 16-year-old in 2003, later suggesting he felt the players ahead of him meant he would have had few chances to break into the club’s first team.
But during the 2010s, the club’s most highly-rated youngsters found themselves with even fewer chances, as Barca had one of the best squads in world football.
Between 2010 and 2019, Sergi Roberto (who made his debut in 2010) was the only player to come through Barcelona’s youth ranks and really establish themselves in the first team.
Ansu Fati was the next, emerging as an exciting 16-year-old in the 2019-20 campaign. Ronald Araujo also came through that season but the Uruguayan might not be best considered a La Masia graduate, as he was signed for the club’s reserves when he was already a professional at the age of 19.
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But Altimira believes young players having their paths blocked wasn’t just a question of finding quality in the way. Paradoxically — at a time when La Masia players inspired the first team — the club’s attitude towards its youth academy changed, despite the good talent still coming through.
Messi won the 2010 Ballon d’Or, with Iniesta second and Xavi third (Lluis Gene/AFP via Getty Images)
“Our job was making sure the right players made it up to the under-19s,” Altimira says. “Above that is the Barca B team (now known as Barcelona Atletic, the reserve team that plays in Spain’s third tier). That is where we saw weird stuff going on.
“The club started to fill the B team with players from other clubs. They were ‘veterans’ for what the team normally is, and you could see they would never make it into the first team.
“La Masia’s youngsters already saw themselves stuck in front of a big barrier to getting first-team minutes, and then with the B team they were suddenly just as stuck, and I totally understood their frustrations.”
Perhaps the most obvious change at this time was the signing of several Brazilian youngsters, none of whom went on to have any real impact at Barca.
If we go back to 2013 and include the €7.9million (£6.7m; $8.4m at current rates) Santos were paid for first-option rights on three youth players (this was agreed as part of Barca’s deal to sign Neymar), the Catalan club spent at least €30.8m (plus undisclosed loan fees) on these players.
Robert Goncalves, Marlon Santos, Vitinho, Gabriel Novaes, Gustavo Maia, Matheus Fernandes and Matheus Pereira all came to Barca between 2015 and 2020 but were never first-team regulars.
Eric Garcia, Xavi Simons, Sergio Gomez, Adrian Bernabe and Robert Navarro were among the players who opted to leave La Masia at this time. Dani Olmo left in 2014.
Xavi Simons, playing for a Barca youth side in 2011, aged eight (Jasper Juinen/Getty Images)
“As much as we tried to sell the Barcelona brand, there were players and families who were very seduced by offers elsewhere,” says Altimira. “Many of those moves were more money-oriented, others for sporting reasons. Our job was to try to make them see Barca is different, and to develop a sense of belonging to the club to those youngsters.”
There were other questionable recruitment decisions during this time.
In July 2016, Barca signed left-back Lucas Digne, who was about to turn 23, for €16.5million from Paris Saint-Germain to be Jordi Alba’s backup. At that time, Alex Grimaldo (now impressing at Bayer Leverkusen and a Spain international) was shining in the reserves. Two years later, Digne was sold to Everton after struggling to adapt, and a year later Barca spent €20m on Junior Firpo from Betis. Left-backs Cucurella (now at Chelsea and also a Spain international) and Juan Miranda (now a regular at Betis who played once for Spain in 2021) were looking to break through from the academy, but they were passed over.
In an exclusive interview with The Athletic last month,
Garcia, the centre-back who left Barcelona for Manchester City in 2017 (but he returned to Barca in 2021), previously explained to The Athletic his decision to leave Barca.
“I was 16 and nearing the end of my contract,” he said. “I was not expecting Barca to promise me minutes with the first team or anything like that. City knocked on the door and offered a sporting project in which I did not have a guaranteed path to the first team, but had a general idea of my development that I could not foresee at La Masia.”
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Alex Collado is another example. In 2018, with Ernesto Valverde as Barca manager, academy talent was getting closer to the first team. A source close to Valverde says the Basque “believed Collado could have a role to play” but then “out of the blue, and through reports in the media, he learned Barca had signed Malcom”.
The Brazilian’s €41million arrival from Bordeaux was another move that did not work out. Last season, Collado left Barca permanently to join Betis, who after salary-limit struggles were forced to loan him to Al Okhdood in Saudi Arabia.
Barcelona’s original youth academy building, pictured in 2011 (Yann Bernal/Getty Images)
The upheaval in Barca’s sporting direction since Guardiola’s departure in 2012 has not helped. A total of 11 different executives have come and gone since: Andoni Zubizarreta, Ariedo Braida, Javier Bordas, Carles Rexach, Jordi Mestre, Robert Fernandez, Eric Abidal, Pep Segura, Ramon Planes, Mateu Alemany and Jordi Cruyff. Deco is the club’s current sporting director.
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Furthermore, some sources working at La Masia now say they believe training methods and the playing philosophy were changed during this time. They suggested Segura’s influence was a key aspect in this, with less emphasis put on technical skill.
“The talent at Barcelona academy is immense, but if we were able to add the physical dimension into that great talent, that would make La Masia even better,” Segura said in response. “That’s why in my approach at La Masia (between 2017-2019) I wanted to work on player’s strength and design individual programs to develop them.”
In December 2021, Xavi spoke of his surprise at seeing how things had changed since he left as a player in 2015. He was talking specifically about first-team training — but his comments suggested something had changed at youth level too.
“Positional play (juego de posicion) has not been trained at Barcelona for years,” he said. “It’s incredible. Some players still need to understand the way we want to play. It is strange to see Barca first-team footballers who do not understand positional play.
“I’ve only been here for a month but I can tell multiple things need to be changed. Bring new players in, of course, but I am talking about dynamics, routines and our philosophy.”
A lot has changed at Barcelona’s academy in recent years. The facilities have been modernised. The number of children staying there has increased — more than 80 young athletes live at the club’s training complex while the old La Masia building housed fewer than 20. Policies are changing too.
Barca sources now describe certain talents as “specific projects”. They are seen as the most gifted ones that the club must make an extra effort to keep.
Multiple sources who have worked at La Masia believe that money was “the defining factor in the vast majority of players who decided to leave the club” over the past decade. Moves have been taken to counter that.
Altimira explains how Fati and Ilaix Moriba both signed contracts with “higher figures than usual” in 2019, with Fati linked to Nice and Manchester City said to be interested in Moriba. Their new deals were worth a reported €2million a year — a huge wage for a 16-year-old.
“In the end, we believed that the worst-case scenario with them was to sell them abroad for a reasonable amount of money,” Altimira says. “That was certainly the case with Moriba (who joined RB Leipzig for €16million in 2021).”
Brexit has played a role in evolving this trend. Now English clubs are not allowed to sign foreign talents under the age of 18. However, City were still making enquiries about Cubarsi last year. The City Football Group (CFG) planned to have him play for sister-club Girona as a stepping stone before moving to Manchester.
Yamal and Cubarsi celebrate with their Barcelona team-mates (Eric Verhoeven/Soccrates/Getty Images)
Cubarsi has been in recent talks with Barcelona over signing a new longer-term contract, with plans to raise his release clause to €1billion, as has already been done with Yamal.
Both those players represent the very best of La Masia. For years, expert professionals have taught them how to play the kind of football Barca aspire to. Cubarsi’s passing and composure on the ball already stand out at the elite European level.
Prior to his involvement, the first team had been crying out for a player with his particular skill set at centre-back. The youth academy helped form exactly what they needed.
Cubarsi is the 204th graduate to make their debut since the La Masia story started back in 1979. Barca fans will hope to see many more just like him, and now there is a sense the youth academy is in a better place than it has been for years.
It just took a financial crisis for the club to realise it.
(Top image: Getty Images. Visual design by Samuel Richardson)
