"Daily Sports" reporter Thomas Andrew wrote an article to express his opinion, believing that Rashford is Barcelona's surprise signing this season. The team's success has benefited from youth training and the introduction of experienced players.
In August, almost no one would bet that Rashford would become a strong signing for Barcelona in the 2025/2026 season. However, it is now early November and it must be admitted that the return on investment for the England international is almost unbeatable.
This fact reveals that we need to abandon some outdated views. For example, Barcelona needs to follow the trend and sign young people with reasonable prices and potential, and hope that they can adapt to Barcelona's "red and blue model."
However, the reality is cruel, at least in the eyes of Barcelona's sports department, this is indeed the case. Looking back at the transfer operations in the past few years, we can find that successful signings often come from players who have proven themselves. The controversial signings of young players have left little mark. Since Pedri joined, except for Badji's performance, other young players have had little presence in the first-team starting lineup.
In short, Barcelona's resurgence is due to the miracle of the youth academy and the contribution of those capable players or improving players (such as Juan Garcia).
The best performer last season was Inigo Martinez, who showed his defensive dominance. Lewandowski continued to respond with goals, while Raphinha also proved his world-class level. At that time, Inigo was 34 years old, Lewandowski was 36 years old, and Rafinha was 28 years old. Of course, we cannot forget Szczesny’s contribution.
Today, we no longer remember Barcelona’s struggles when trying to sign Enderrick or purge Vitor Roque. Judging from the current situation, these two players have not lived up to expectations after landing in Europe.
It is understandable that the club's financial situation is not ideal and they need to run the team smarter. But until financial conditions allow, we might as well face reality: continue to pay the salaries of players of the caliber of Lewandowski or Raphinha, and at the same time, don’t give up on Inigo Martinez and Rashford easily.
Experience in recent years has shown that this magical combination can only be achieved by clubs with a unique youth training system: leaving the adventure to their own youth training players and allowing young people to grow in La Masia as much as possible. In addition, Deco and his assistants need to succeed in future overseas signings.