The Joan Gamper Trophy is not well known outside Spain. Named after one of Barcelona’s founding members and former presidents, it is awarded to the winner of a friendly match that the Blaugrana host before each season. It used to be a four-team competition, but now it’s just a single match, and the 2025 edition on Monday will feature Monaco.

Twelve months ago, Tottenham were Barcelona’s opponents. On the Catalans’ bench was 16-year-old winger Lamine Yamal, a player few knew outside of Spain. There was probably some information the casual football fan might have picked up about the La Masia boy who made his debut for Barcelona at 15, but so what? Barca were too broke to fill a gap on the wing, so Xavi probably had no choice but to let him play.

On August 8, 2023, the whole story changed. Yamal was a peripheral player in Barca’s team during the pre-season tour of the United States, shielded from the spotlight. But then, at the Gamper Trophy, he was unleashed. What followed was perhaps the most important 15-minute cameo in recent Barca history, as Yamal dismantled Tottenham, proving he was ready to become a first-team regular and perhaps take Spain and Europe by storm.

Suddenly there was hope. Barca, strapped for cash and without any reason for optimism, had a singular, central figure around whom everything revolved. It would prove to be a risky strategy – and it still is – but since then Yamal has become the European star that people around Catalonia always saw him as.