Recently, Osasuna's youth teams have forged a group of outstanding players at an impressive rate, an achievement that has been guided by the precision of the "Tahuna 2017" strategy, the club's blueprint for the future. Back in 2014, the team suffered a painful relegation that ended a 14-year run in La Liga.
Osasuna's head of youth training, Angel Alcalde, has revealed that the club is suffering from an unprecedented sporting and institutional crisis due to the debts accumulated by the previous board of directors, which amounted to €100 million. The year immediately following, Osasuna narrowly escaped relegation to the Liga B, which Alcalde warned almost spelled the team's demise.
However, Javier Flano helped his side survive relegation with a 2-2 draw against Sabadell with a shot on target in extra time. That victory served as a turning point for Osasuna, who returned to the Spanish top flight the following season despite limited resources. Alcalde said, "This relegation gave us hope for survival and we started to breathe fresh air and look to the future ...... At that time, Osasuna finally built a long-shelved project for the youth camp."
Tahuna, the name of the Osasuna Youth Academy and Training Ground, was renamed "The Tahuna Method" in an effort to re-establish the Osasuna Youth Academy as a national, European and global benchmark.
Alcalde conducted a thorough review of the youth training system and found that there was a lack of unified goals and plans. He admits, "At first, I saw each coach working independently and there was a lack of uniformity. Today, the situation is completely opposite. We have a unified strategy that all coaches are familiar with and follow."
Developing players is not an easy task at Osasuna, what is even harder is keeping them in the team. The club has seen numerous homegrown players move to other teams, such as Javi Martinez and Mikel Merino. However, things have changed significantly in recent years. Nearly half of Jacoba Alasate's squad is made up of players from Tahona, including Davy Garcia, Javi Martinez, Moncayola, Kike, Oyer, Unai Garcia, Robert Torres, Juan Perez, Arezzo, and Bavello.
Alcalde emphasized, "We want players to choose to stay at Osasuna, even if they can get better financial terms elsewhere ...... We want players and their families to believe that on a competitive level, Osasuna is the best option for growing into a professional soccer player. We have proven that, and the numbers are the best proof."
Former Osasuna captain Patsy Punyar, who joined the youth academy at the age of nine until his retirement at 38, became responsible for training and talent management at the youth academy. Faced with a competitive environment in the province of Navarra, which has only 650,000 inhabitants, Punial and his team built up a vast scouting network to ensure that talented youngsters were identified early on and brought to Tahona.
Punyar and his team have developed a manual that identifies the key elements that players must follow: tactical identity, initiative, comprehensiveness and responsibility. Alcalde added: "These values are embodied in our players such as David Garcia, Oyer, Unai Garcia and Moncayola. They are solid players who contribute greatly to the team every week."
Last year, the 23-year-old Moncayola signed a 10-year contract extension until 2031, when he will be 32. Moncayola signed the deal after being called up to the provisional Spanish national team roster for the Tokyo Olympics, where Spain won silver. Alcalde said, "Moncayola is a great example of what you can learn at the Tahuna Youth Academy ...... Osasuna has signed him to a contract that will allow him to play here for 10 years. We are happy and very proud of the confidence our youth players have in Osasuna."
While the success of the "Tahuna Method" has been due to careful planning and talent identification, the club believes it can do more with its youth academy, thanks to CVC's investment in the Spanish soccer club through its Boost LaLiga program, which has injected $3.2 billion (€1.9 billion) into the club for the development of infrastructure projects.
With this investment, the club will expand the size of the natural turf pitch at Stadio Tahona and build a stadium to accommodate 4,000 reserve and women's soccer players. In addition, the club will buy back land that it was previously forced to sell to local authorities due to financial problems. Alcalde said, "We are excited about the CVC project and the better our facilities, the better we can develop our players. Tahona is 40 years old and some aspects leave something to be desired.The CVC agreement is a major boost as it will allow us to progress with our plans."
The most exciting part, however, is the weekly practices on the field, where fans are increasingly identifying with a team made up mostly of Tarhona natives. As Alcalde noted, "We are now seeing something that was difficult to do in the past, Osasuna has retained the top players from our youth program and they have decided to stay here. The path has been mapped out and it's very satisfying to see Osasuna lead so many youth players to play together."
Punyar concluded, "We can't imagine Osasuna without homegrown players because our fans wouldn't recognize that. We are not better or worse than other teams, but that's us."
