10 years since 11 from La Masia appeared in the line-up
25 November 2012 was a very special day for FC Barcelona. That was the date when the late Tito Vilanova fielded a team of eleven players against Levante who were all graduates of La Masia.
Dani Alves was the only imported player that started that day, but after he got injured in 15th minute, he was replaced by Martin Montoya, thus completing the historic line-up.
It lasted until the 61st minute, when Jordi Alba came off for Adriano Correia.
Barça won that day in Valencia, 4-0 with goals from Messi (2), Iniesta and Cesc Fàbregas. That was the famous season when the Catalans won the league with 100 points.
The XI
The full team that made history was: Valdés; Jordi Alba, Puyol, Piqué, Montoya (15th min sub for Dani Alves); Cesc Fàbregas, Sergio Busquets, Xavi Hernández; Iniesta, Messi and Pedro.
Just Jordi Alba and Sergio Busquets remain in the squad today, while Xavi Hernández is of course the manager, and Gerard Piqué only departed a few days ago.
But only Valdés and Puyol are now retired, the former leaving for England and Belgium before hanging up his boots in 2017 (he coached the Barça U19A team in 2019), while Carles Puyol left at the same time, but did not go to another club.
Montoya is now at Betis, Cesc Fàbregas at Como in Italy, Iniesta at Vissel Kobe in Japan, Lionel Messi at PSG and Pedro plays for Lazio.