Jordi Cruyff reveals why Barcelona purposefully delayed Lamine Yamal’s debut | OneFootball

FC Barcelona as a club has always given special priority to the development of young talents. After all, the Catalan club is renowned for boasting arguably the world’s best youth academy. However, certain Barcelona prodigies simply defy even the highest of established standards.

One such player is undeniably Lamine Yamal, who has already established himself as one of the world’s most recognisable footballers at the age of 18. However, Barça’s new number ‘10’ was not always this famous and even he had to start somewhere.

Despite the fact that he got his official first team debut under the orders of Xavi Hernandez, it was revealed recently that his actual debut could have possibly come much earlier. In fact, Jordi Cruyff recently revealed more details about that whole ordeal.

Barcelona deliberately delayed Yamal’s debut

Yamal made his Barcelona first team debut under Xavi Hernandez. (Photo by Alex Caparros/Getty Images)

As per Cruyff, Xavi wanted to give the 15-year-old winger his debut much earlier, but Cruyff himself and Mateu Alemany stopped him in order to secure Yamal’s long-term future, as quoted by SPORT:

“Xavi wanted to debut him earlier. We had to discuss it with Mateu [Alemany]. The great thing was that we always worked as a team—decisions were made together and with open dialogue.”

They explained the situation to Xavi, and spoke about the dangers of giving him a platform before they could even tie him down to a longer deal:

“We told Xavi, ‘He’s 15, he’s not under contract. If he plays 10 matches and performs like we’ve seen… we’ll have exposed him to the market unprotected.”

However, with Yamal’s agents Ivan de la Pena and new representative Jorge Mendes, Barcelona always remained comfortable and felt safe that his future would be with the club:

“He always prioritized the footballing side. With him, we felt very safe: if Lamine debuted, he wouldn’t betray Barça… We knew Mendes wouldn’t hurt Barça.”

Yet, Jordi Cruyff confessed that Yamal’s debut would have come much earlier had it not been for these technical details to be sorted out:

“If not, he would’ve debuted much earlier.”

Undeniable talent that shook up the locker room

As for his talent, that remains unquestionable for the son of the late Johan Cruyff:

“The things he did with the ball were special. His year-on-year improvement is incredible.”

In fact, he also spoke about Yamal’s impact within the Barcelona dressing room and just how impressive he was:

“What struck me most was the unspoken reaction of the veteran players. When he started doing his thing, they just looked at each other, like: ‘What is this?’ Because it wasn’t normal.”

As for what’s next for Yamal, his future is safe with Barça and he remains committed to the club. After all, he has already signed a renewal until 2031 and it seems like that decision to delay his debut has paid off in terms of securing the player’s long-term future.