A report from the CIES Football Observatory revealed that U20 players accounted for 15 percent of Barca’s minutes in league matches over the past year, while other LALIGA EA SPORTS clubs also rank highly.
The academies of La Liga clubs have long been renowned for producing world-class talents, and a new report from the CIES Football Observatory has underlined that Spanish clubs’ youth development remains as strong as ever.
The report, titled “Youth employment: World rankings”, ordered clubs based on the percentage of minutes in their domestic league matches which have gone to young players over the past year, from April 2023 to April 2024. When looking at U20s – that is to say, teenager players – it’s Barcelona who come out on top for all clubs in Europe’s five major leagues, as 15% of the league minutes given out by Xavi have been to teenage talents, such as Lamine Yamal, Gavi and Pau Cubarsi.
As Xavi explained earlier this season in a press conference: “We must trust the young players, the homegrown players. I think they’re ready, as I see their faces and they’re hungry. I’m really excited about this because it’s a solid and brave decision.”
It wasn’t only U20s that the CIES Football Observatory analysed. The report also detailed the percentages for other age categories, and FC Barcelona come second in Europe’s top five leagues for the fielding of U19s. 9% of the Catalan club’s minutes in the past year were for players who hadn’t yet celebrated their 19th birthday, and only Ligue 1’s Toulouse had a higher percentage, at 9.1%.
In terms of U21s, Barcelona are third with 22%, only behind the French sides RC Strasbourg (26.8%) and Lyon (23.2%). And, Barca are joined near the top of this ranking by other La Liga sides, as Valencia are fifth for minutes played by U21s, with 15.6%, while Girona are sixth in the ranking, with 14.2%.
It’s Valencia who are the top-rated Spanish club in the report’s rankings for U22s and U23s, sitting second for use of U22s in Europe’s major leagues, with 28.1% of Ruben Baraja’s minutes going to players in this age category, and fourth on the continent for U23s, with 37.6%.
When looking at the top 20 clubs for use of U23s in Europe’s five major leagues, only France’s Ligue 1 has more representatives than La Liga, with Valencia, Girona, Villarreal and Barcelona all featuring highly in this ranking.
La Liga’s use of homegrown players
This latest CIES Football Observatory looked strictly at age, but another report from the same institution earlier this season similarly studied the use of homegrown players by clubs in the top European leagues. In that study, they counted the players who’d spent at least three seasons at a training club between the ages of 15 and 21.
Five of the top six in the standings for clubs with academy alumni in their current squads were La Liga clubs: Athletic Club were first (16 players), Real Sociedad were second (12 players), Valencia were third (11 players) and then Osasuna, Las Palmas and Bundesliga side Freiburg were joint-fourth, with nine academy graduates each.
Clearly Spanish clubs are developing many quality players in their academies and then placing trust in these talents in important La Liga fixtures. It’s a brave approach, as Xavi outlined, but one which can lead to very bright futures for these teams.
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