FCB Miami: Barcelona plans US youth academy

author: Jeff Rusnak
source: Sun Sentinel
date: 30 November 2008
editing: fcbtransfers.blogspot.com





The American approach to developing home-grown players could take a turn for the better if FC Barcelona is granted an expansion team in Miami. And no one, perhaps, stands to benefit more than youth players in South Florida.

Barcelona CEO Joan Oliver was in Miami recently to fine-tune the club's MLS expansion bid with fellow investor Marcelo Claure. While here, Oliver addressed the club's plans to create a youth soccer academy in Miami that would mirror the Barca model in Spain. Oliver said Barca is insistent on beginning MLS play in 2010 and would open the Miami academy next year.

The club would begin by seeking South Florida players who would be nurtured in the Barca style. "We will set up the academy before starting the team, as soon as possible," Oliver said. "It would probably be in a couple of months. At this moment, we have the system in place since we already have academies in Argentina, Brazil and Mexico..."

Unlike other European powers who buy most of their top talent, Barcelona has been successful in building its roster through an in-house academy. The current graduates include Lionel Messi, who began at Barca at age 12, Bojan Krkic (age 9), goalkeeper Victor Valdes (10), and midfielders Xavi (11) and Andres Iniesta (12).

Like the Barca model, the Miami club would seek out talented players as young as 12, what Oliver called, "the ideal scenario" for instilling the Barca ethic. That ethic is to not only win, but to play Barca's beautiful game, in which skill and imagination take precedence over speed and strength. "That is absolutely part of our DNA," Oliver said. "We are the essence of this kind of playing. We are not able to promise that we will win every year, but we will promise to play in this way. We will replicate that in the South Florida team."

Oliver envisions that a Barca Miami team will include young players who emerge from its academies, and high-salaried Designated Players who would leave the senior team to play here at the end of their careers. French striker Thierry Henry comes to mind as a DP candidate.

Oliver concedes that the Miami franchise wouldn't be able to match big Barca in terms of overall quality, and there's no evidence that there's a Messi in our midst. But, with Barcelona in the neighborhood there may be a greater likelihood of at least improving the aesthetic of MLS and the American game.

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