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It is widely known that during the dictatorship of General Francisco Franco, Barcelona went through great turmoil. The club, projected as the symbol of Catalan resistance during the Spanish Civil War, was an easy target for the Franco-regime and his supporters.
Barcelona was also bombarded in 1938 in Nazi-airstrike fashion, which destroyed the club museum and many of their trophies. Just a year previously, club president Josep Sunyol was murdered by the Fascist sympathisers of dictator Franco.
While Barcelona struggled, financially and politically, their arch-rivals Real Madrid, having the support of the Fascist regime, went on to amass one silverware after another. From 1955 to 1960, they won the European Cup five times in a row, establishing themselves as one of the most decorated sides in the continent.
Therefore, struggling is a part of the Barcelona DNA. It is what has defined the history of the club and thus makes the Catalans’ recent success all the more sweeter.
The importance and the necessity of La Masia
One of the ways in which Barcelona attempted to counter the dominance of Real Madrid was to use a core group of players who were not purchased from outside, but were developed under their watchful guidance. This was an effective money-saving strategy, although Barcelona has never really acknowledged this aspect of the La Masia story.
The La Masia academy came to be built during the presidency of José Luis Núnez, a man notorious for his penny-pinching. He once famously declined to offer Diego Maradona, the best player of the world at the time, an improved contract, saying that the Argentine’s demands were too high.
Nunez believed that Barcelona would be unable to financially compete at the top tier of Spanish football, if they continued buying players from outside, with the increase of transfer-fees with each passing year.
Núnez stepped into power at Barcelona in 1978, remaining the president of the club till 2000. La Masia, which came into being in 1979, was one of his first major contributions as the club’s president.
The idea was to develop not only a Cruyffian style of tiki-taka football, but also to save money by avoiding huge transfers.
Players as young as nine years old would be trained in the Barcelona way, so that by the time they graduated to the senior team, they will already have known the intricacies of playing possession-based football.
This is one of the reasons why players such as the 20-year-old Sergio Busquets fit seamlessly into the team when newly appointed manager Pep Guardiola promoted him to the first team in 2008.
Pep Guardiola described it best when he said:
The player who has passed through La Masia has something different to the rest, it's a plus that only comes from having competed in a Barcelona shirt from the time you were a child.
One of the specialised ways in which La Masia students train is by use of the Rondo. It is a light training exercise or game in which players form a small circle and pass the ball to other teammates who are also part of the circle.
Two or more players within the circle try to win the ball back, and the player whose pass is intercepted is then asked to be the ball winner as a form of punishment, while the one who wins the ball gets to join the others and be the passer.
The Rondo was developed by Laureano Ruiz in the 1970s, a La Masia youth coach who had been instructed by Johan Cruyff to conduct small sessions every day. The Rondo helps to develop the passing skills of players but at the same time it also allows them the chance to learn how to nick the ball off an opponent. It is a unique exercise in which both close-range passing and effective ball-winning can be learnt simultaneously.
This is also one of the reasons why players who arrive from outside struggle enormously to adapt to Barcelona. It is a unique style that takes years of perfection and training and a certain technical mastery over the ball. Players who have been coached by other methods seldom possess the technical rigour and ball skills necessary to learn playing in the Barcelona way.
Some players learn quicker and better than others. Thierry Henry adapted to Barcelona's playing system quicker than Alexander Hleb did, even if both players arrived from Arsenal.
The Frenchman went on to become a key player in the forward position, while Hleb was loaned off to VfB Stuttgart. Later, a player such as Andre Gomes, who was very impressive at Valencia, had a torrid time at Barcelona.
The fruits of La Masia
Although it was Johan Cruyff who brought the tiki-taka to Barcelona, and by implication to La Masia, it was Pep Guardiola, the Dutchman’s most studious disciple, who truly implemented the Cruyffian style at the Nou Camp since 2008.
In the 2010 Ballon d’Or ceremony, Lionel Messi, Andres Iniesta and Xavi Hernandez were voted the three best footballers in the world. All three of them were La Masia graduates. The La Masia trained-footballers such as Gerard Pique, Carles Puyol, Sergio Busquets, Cecs Fabregas, Pedro Rodriguez and Xavi Hernandez all played key roles in the Spanish World Cup winning team in 2010.
La Masia-trained Barcelona goalkeeper Victor Valdes was a substitute goalkeeper for Spain at the 2010 FIFA World Cup where Andres Iniesta scored the winning goal in the final against Netherlands.
The achievement on the national stage was a continuity of Barcelona’s class and quality demonstrated in club football. In 2008-09, the Blaugrana went on to dominate world football, winning every competition they played in. In total, they won a stunning haul of six trophies that year.
The La Masia based players also played a major role in Spain’s 2012 UEFA Euro championship victory, where they famously beat Italy 4-0 in the final. It was Spain’s second consecutive European Championship after Luis Aragones had also led La Furia Roja to the title in 2008.
The fact remains that from 2008 to 2013, Barcelona, and by extension, Spain, dominated the world of football. In an interview with the New York Times, Joachim Low, the German national team manager said:
"You can see it in every pass, how Spain play is how Barcelona play. They can hardly be beaten. They are extremely confident and very calm in the way they circulate the ball."
Later, after Pep Guardiola became the manager of Bayern Munich in 2013, he would take the teachings of Cruyff to Germany. This led Joachim Low to benefit from the Bayern Munich players who also formed the core of his 2014 World Cup-winning side.
La Masia is integral to the survival of Barcelona
In recent years, Barcelona president Josep Maria Bartomeu has disregarded the La Masia system. Players are brought in from other clubs at eye watering fees.
Recently, reports emerged that since the 40th Barcelona president Bartomeu assumed office, the club has spent an astonishing £1 billion in the purchase of 32 players. Most of these players have been flops at Barcelona, the biggest of whom has been Philippe Coutinho who arrived from Liverpool in 2018; the Brazilian alone setting Barcelona back by £142 million.
Barcelona are in a massive financial crisis, and their recent underwhelming performances have only added to their misery.
This may be the right time to shift Barcelona back to the La Masia way. While big money superstars failed to impress, 17-year-old La Masia product Ansu Fati and the 21-year-old Riqui Puig have massively impressed.
Both these La Masia graduates exemplify once again that the Blaugrana possess talent in abundance, but must also give such talented individuals opportunities to play and grow in the first team. La Masia-trained players are also more loyal to the club, since they always cherish a childhood dream to play for Barcelona. Such players will also not demand exorbitant wages unlike other reputed players.
The Blaugrana must show faith in its old ideals once again. The club must immediately change the way it promotes young talent and resist the temptation to sign big-name players. The consequences of not doing so may have severe repercussions for the future of Barcelona.
