La Masia de Can Planes, or simply La Masia as it is often referred to, is the name of FC Barcelona's youth football squad, which, being made up of over three hundred young players, is widely recognised as one of the best youth squads in the world. The minimum age of admittance to the club is six years old, and the first way of entering the club is through the try outs each year for boys ranging from the ages of six to eight years old. Of these one thousand only two hundred are accepted annually into the club, making it one of the most elite, and consequentially difficult, youth clubs to enter. As well as this early intake of boys, the club allows entrance to boys ranging in age from seven to fifteen whom it believes have special potential in football. To ensure La Masia obtains these best players, it employs a team of forty five talent scouts; fifteen working within Spain, fifteen within Catalonia, and the final ten working in countries worldwide. When the scouts believe they've seen someone with extra special potential, they will approach them and perhaps offer them a position within the club. Being spotted by one La Masia's talent scouts is the only other way of entering the youth academy. The success of the club can be seen in that currently three of the world's top five players were trained there. En.wikipedia.org/wiki/La_Masia talentspot.wordpress.com/2011/03/13/la-masia-from-boy-to-man/ www.enotes.com/topic/La_Masia
