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Graham Hunter
Multiple Authors
They do say that no house is a happy home until it hears the pitter-patter of tiny feet. In which case, casa Real Madrid will be in a state of pure bliss ahead of their UEFA Champions League second-leg visit to Manchester City on Tuesday.
Coach Álvaro Arbeloa is suddenly responsible for the greatest influx of young talent into Real Madrid’s first team in living memory. And it has taken less than nine weeks, never mind nine months’ gestation, of him in charge to produce it.
Los Blancos‘ drive to win LaLiga, plus their push for the Champions League quarterfinals, is being sustained by a clutch of teenagers: Thiago Pitarch (18 years old), Dani Yáñez (18), Jorge Cestero (19), Víctor Valdepeñas (18) and Diego Aguado (19), while César Palacios (21) and Manuel Ángel (22) have been hauled up from the B team and given debuts. These breakthrough kids join slightly more established academy graduates Gonzalo García and Raul Asencio, who are relatively new emergences but have 123 first-team appearances and 20 goals/assists between them.
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And, just as a side note, although these next stars didn’t come from the academy known as La Fábrica (the Factory), Madrid’s first-team counts heavily on 21-year-old Türkiye international Arda Güler (who scored a wonder-goal from his own half at the weekend), 18-year-old Argentina starlet Franco Mastantuono and 20-year-old Spain international Dean Huijsen.
For generations, since Johan Cruyff first took over at Barcelona, it’s the Blaugrana who have heavily backed his “if you’re good enough, you’re old enough” mantra. Now Arbeloa has, single-handedly, installed that same idea at the Santiago Bernabéu just as we reach the 10th anniversary of Cruyff’s death.
What’s more, waiting in the wings and heavily quoted as “factory-produced” first-team fixtures of the future are Joan Martínez (19), Lamini Fati (19) and Jesús Fortea (18).
The last time anything remotely similar took place at Madrid is still the stuff of fabulous legend, but it began as far back as 1983 — not far off half a century ago. It’s when the Quinta del Buitre group broke through and Madrid’s academy became, arguably, as powerful and prestigious as at any time in the club’s imperious history.
That the nickname was coined for the group’s most recognized and charismatic player, Emilio Butragueño: El Buitre, or “The Vulture.” The other four members were Miguel Pardeza, Manolo Sanchís, Míchel González and Rafael Martín Vázquez.
In their glorious era, the Vulture gang won 16 trophies, including two UEFA Cups, six LaLiga titles — five of them consecutively — three Copa del Rey trophies, four Spanish Supercopas and one Copa de la Liga. Out of all of them, however, only Sanchís won the Champions League (twice).
Back to the present. Back to this season’s Champions League quest. Let me try to give you a glimpse of the euphoria the emergence of these home-grown, all-Spanish, dynamic, confident kids is causing.
Pitarch is, without question, the leader of the gang. When he was subbed off against Elche on Saturday in the 63rd minute, the Bernabéu rose, as one, and simply roared. They already adore him. When Yáñez cut in off the right and used his left foot to bend the ball on to Huijsen’s head for 3-0, the old hands of the first team mobbed the debutant kid, ecstatic for him.
Arbeloa’s comments afterward helped explain how seismic this threatens to be.
“For someone like me, who came up through Madrid’s youth system and reached the first team … I think I can die happy thanks to a night like this,” he told RMTV. “After the match I was talking to Yáñez and Aguado, who were the first players I began to coach in our academy when they were 13 or 14. To be able to give them their chance at the Bernabéu is a dream come true for me.
“Add to that [Dani] Carvajal, the quintessential homegrown player, as well as Fran [Garcia], Thiago, César, Gonzalo … the feeling is almost indescribable. I’m so happy and proud. It’s not just about putting them in, but how they played.
“It almost reminded me of what Real Madrid was like during that Quinta del Buitre era. I’m sure Emilio [now Madrid’s vice president] who was there in the stands, is very proud of what he saw today.
“It’s essential there are academy graduates in the Real Madrid first team because of what they contribute. Not just talent, but that DNA they carry within them — what they transmit to anyone who joins from outside our club. Hopefully, in the future, whoever is sitting in this manager’s chair, we will always see our academy graduates in the first team.”
Part of what makes this particularly sweet for Madridistas is that their talent farm went fallow for years. Carvajal and Nacho emerged, definitively, in 2013-14, but, apart from Lucas Vázquez, no other youth-team graduate had established himself and became a genuine first-team player until now. That’s 12 low-return years.
Suddenly, Madrid haven’t simply ripped up that dismal record, they’ve also fallen in step with the youth revolution around all of Europe’s great clubs.
In last season’s Champions League, Paris Saint-Germain’s Senny Mayulu became the youngest scorer in a final for precisely 30 years, Arsenal’s Max Dowman created history on Saturday as the Premier League’s youngest scorer, This season Kenan Yildiz, 20, was appointed as Juventus’ youngest-ever captain, Lamine Yamal is smashing records for club and country at 18 years old, and Lennart Karl has racked up seven goals and three assists in 26 Champions League and Bundesliga matches while only 17.
It’s crazy to even hint that he’s a “veteran,” having just turned 21, but Güler — who has been playing continental football since he was 16, said: “I may be shy and reserved off the field, but when we go out on to the pitch, I know that age doesn’t matter.
“We are all the same there: teammates. I don’t exactly know what happens to me when I go out to play, but I take on a different personality — I go into warrior mode.”
Of course, none of this is new territory for Arbeloa’s rival on Tuesday.
Pep Guardiola did exactly the same thing, drawing Pedro and Sergio Busquets with him from Barcelona’s youth system into a Treble-winning season, perpetually trusting youth talent right up to today with Max Alleyne, Nico O’Reilly, Rico Lewis and Savinho at City.
Victory, and a quarterfinal place, no matter the age of whoever secures those, is the only headline item at the Etihad on Tuesday.
Now, however, Madrid approach the task with a sudden, not to say unexpected, flush of youthful exuberance and swagger.
