FCBARCELONA.CAT

11.10.2008 13:15

La Masia’s first team eleven

David Puig

Over half of the FC Barcelona first team squad rose through the club’s youth system and 11 of them gathered together for an historic photograph that shows the best of the present and the future.

Barça has always been a reference for every club in football for different reasons, such as its social status, sporting character, the presence of some of the world’s best players and the fact that the team always plays attacking football, much to the delight of the fans. For many years, the Blaugrana have also been regarded as one of the best at taking advantage of its own youth system. This season, no less than eleven players that have come through the ranks are now members of Pep Guardiola’s first-team squad. Barça TV and www.fcbarcelona.cat met them all in the Miniestadi where they made their leap up to the first team for an historic photo.

Messi and Xavi

The longest-serving players, Xavi, Carles Puyol, Víctor Valdés and Andrés Iniesta, were joined by Lionel Messi, Albert Jorquera and Bojan Krkic and now more starlets have been promoted under Pep Guardiola with Gerard Piqué, Pedro, Sergio Busquets and Víctor Vázquez moving up. Messi and Xavi are two emblematic players with the Argentinian touted as the world’s best and a clear successor to Ronaldinho as the idol of the Camp Nou. Xavi was voted as the best player at the European Championships in the summer and it is difficult to find another midfielder in the game with his quality.

Puyol embodies the dream

Another of the star names to have risen through the ranks and gone on to cement a regular place in the first team is club captain Carles Puyol. One of the best defenders in the world, he embodies the dream of all young players currently in La Masia. With hard work and sacrifice, Puyol was conscious of his limitations and of his virtues and rose steadily to become a stalwart as skipper of the Blaugrana. Every coach that has come and gone during his time in the squad have used him regularly since he made his debut in 1999.

Looking bright

The average age of the eleven players that currently play for the first team is 23.5 years. That clearly shows that the future is guaranteed and there will not be any gaps when there are no players from La Masia while plenty more are waiting to come through and try their luck at the highest level. Puyol, at 30, and Jorquera, at 29, are the most veteran members of the squad while at the other end of the scale Krkic, at 18, and Sergio Busquets, at 20, are the youngest.The first player in the current set-up to make his debut is Xavi as he played his first game on August 18, 1998 against Mallorca in the first leg of the Spanish Super Cup. Busquets was the latest player to make his first appearance when he appeared against Racing Santander in the second round of games of the current season on September 13, 2008.