La Masia

La Masia de Can Planes, usually shortened to La Masia (English: “The Farmhouse”), is a term used for FC Barcelona’s youth academy. The academy includes more than 300 young players. It has been a significant factor in Barcelona’s European success, and produced some world class players. La Masia became the first youth academy to have trained all three finalists for the Ballon d’Or in a single year – Andrés Iniesta, Lionel Messi and Xavi.

La Masia is also the name of FC Barcelona’s football training facilities, originally located near the Camp Nou in the Les Corts district of Barcelona.

La Masia houses about 60 players: 10 in the farmhouse, and the rest in rooms of the adjacent stadium; the rest of the youth players must provide for their own accommodation. The academy is one of the most expensive in Europe, operating at a cost of £5 million a year. The main cost is the dormitory, La Masia itself. The minimum age for the youth program is six years; each year, more than 1,000 boys from the ages of six to eight try out for admittance. The best 200 are selected.

The club also actively seeks for prospective students; it employs a system in which 15 scouts are deployed in Catalonia, 15 in the rest of Spain and 10 scattered throughout the world. To alleviate the expenses of this scouting, the club has an agreement with 15 local clubs for them to train players who are not ready for entry into the youth academy. In return, FC Barcelona gives money, coaching and technical advice to these clubs for their services. While expanding its operations abroad, the club established five schools in Mexico and one in Egypt; successful applicants to these schools become full-time students, receiving academic education and football training.

When Guardiola re-organised the reserve side, he set up a three-staged program to formalise the advancement from Juvenil to Barcelona B and finally to the first team. The first stage of a youth player’s career involves a rotation scheme with Barcelona B. The second stage involves making the player aware of his importance to the team and the expectation that the player will improve cohesion and performance within the reserve side. In the last stage, he is designated a “key” player of the B team and might be called to the first team. One of the players in the third phase is made captain, regardless of the experience of older players.

The teams at Barcelona play from August to May; mild weather at La Masia allows players to train outdoors throughout the year. The youth teams train after school; Barcelona B plays as a professional team, training in the morning and evening. All of the trainers at FC Barcelona are former professional footballers.

Barcelona B, the club’s main youth team, and the 12 other youth teams contained 24 coaches and more than 300 players. There are 56 other employees, including doctors, psychologists, nutritionists, cooks and physiologists. Barcelona B play in a 4–3–3 formation, which is the same formation employed by the first team.

Former technical director Pep Segura attributes the club’s success to its “philosophy of play”: “It is about creating one philosophy, one mentality, from the bottom of the club to the top”. The philosophy consists of the application of total football mixed with traditional Spanish one-touch play (tiqui-taka). The total football approach was derived from the Netherlands football team through Cruyff. The total football approach requires the players to move in a fluid formation, where players can interchange positions quickly.

In the youth academy, there is a large focus on technical ability, which is seen as a pre-requisite for inter-changes. An often-quoted reason for Barcelona’s success is the continuity and commitment with which Barcelona follow the current philosophy of pass and move. Guardiola was the prototype of the pivotal midfielder; famous midfielders Xavi and Iniesta are its custodians.

Another aspect of La Masia is its marked Catalan national character — local talent in the service of a club with a strong, defining sense of the cultural make-up of Catalonia.