Barça give homegrown players more game-time than Madrid
Los Blancos have eight players from the ranks in their squad, compared with Barça's six, but use them much more sparingly in the first team.
Homegrown talent
The starting eleven in Barcelona's 5-0 demolition of Real Madrid in 2010 was made up of eight Barça players from the ranks, and at the time Guardiola had a further two in his squad. Today Ernesto Valverde only has six at his disposal, with Iniesta also on his way at the end of the season, which is in contrast to Real Madrid, where Zinedine Zidane has eight players from the ranks, a third of his full squad.
Yet the minutes Valverde gives to his six homegrown players (21,674') is in sharp contrast to Zidane (13,588'), who regularly builds the spine of his team from players brought in from elsewhere.
La Masia
The six La Masia products at Barcelona (Messi, Iniesta, Piqué, Busquets, Jordi Alba and Sergi Roberto) - even fewer after the departures of Deulofeu and Rafinha - are all first-team regulars, and that's not counting Aleix Vidal (one year in Barça's youth team) and Denis Suárez (a year with Barça B). Nevertheless, Barcelona did line-up in their 2-2 draw away to Celta Vigo on 17 April with no homegrown talent on show, conspicuous because it was the first time in 16 years.
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