Barcelona, the Spanish football champions, signed with goalkeeper Joan Garcia from his neighbor Espanyol after paying the condition of termination of his contract, according to the Catalan club on Wednesday.
The value of the deal reached 26.34 million euros ($ 31 million) for a period of 6 years, according to press reports.
“He has just finished a great season in the Spanish League, and played a major role in the survival of Espanyol,” Barcelona said in a statement that the 24 -year -old arrival arrived.
“He made his distinguished performance, along with his exceptional capabilities at the age of 24, from him a goal for many major clubs around the world, including Barcelona.”
Garcia had bid farewell to the Tuesday – Espanyol fans in a video posted on the media, saying, “I know that this decision will not be easy to understand on everyone.”
“I do not ask you to do so. But I want you to know that it was a very thoughtful decision, not only my career, but also the interest of the club, my family and myself.”
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Joan Garcia joins Barcelona ✅ pic.twitter.com/mZELMecIKN
— FCB World (@forcabarca_ar) June 18, 2025
10 Information about Barcelona goalkeeper Juan Garcia
Garcia started his career in Espanyol before defending the first team at the end of 2021, but he imposed itself essential between the three woods in the 2023-2024 season after the team returned to the ranks of elite clubs.
He finished last season in “La Liga” as the best goalkeeper in the statistics of confrontations (146), and contributed greatly to the team’s stay in the first degree. He kept his nets clean in 8 out of 38 games in the same season.
1- Salint .. Football City
Salent de Ubregat is about 70 km from Barcelona, the birthplace of Juan Garcia, with a population of about 7,000 people.
This city gave birth to an countless number of professional football players such as the former Barcelona player Gabri Garcia – who played 180 games with the team – and the current Real Betis defender Aitor Roypalat, and Almeria defender Edgar Gonzales.
2- In the footsteps of his brother
In his hometown, in the footsteps of his brother Al -Akb, Juan Garcia began his football career in the goalkeeper center and soon starred and presented distinguished levels.
🚨
Joan Garcia joins Barcelona ✅ pic.twitter.com/mZELMecIKN
— FCB World (@forcabarca_ar) June 18, 2025
3- The beginning of his football career
After playing periods with Salent and Menrisa, he joined the Dam team before moving to Espanyol at the age of 15.
On December 12, 2021, he participated for the first time with the first team in the King’s Cup with a 3-2 victory over Solaris. In January 2022, he participated for the first time in the Spanish League against the Elchi team.
4 – Distinguished season
After Espanyol helped to climb the second degree in the 2023-2024 season, Gindia tackled the following season in the first division of the largest number of balls, beating any other goalkeeper, with a total of 146 confrontations.
In the five major European leagues, only Mark Filkan, Brentford goalkeeper, was outperformed by 153.
5- The best goalkeeper
Garcia prevented the largest number of goals in 67 games with Espanyol, keeping his nets clean in 21 games and received 72 goals.
6- The third is the best percentage of confiscations
Garcia achieved the third best repetition rate of 73.71%, and only Unai Simon, Athletic Bilbao goalkeeper, was 77.42%, and Yan Oblak, Atletico Madrid goalkeeper, who won the Zammour Cup, with 74.14%.
Garcia also tackled two penalty kicks out of 6 penalty kicks calculated against his team during the last season, one against Mallorca and the other against Betis.
7- The ninth goalkeeper
Garcia is the ninth goalkeeper who previously played for Barcelona and Espanyol, and Roma Sola was the first goalkeeper at the beginning of the twentieth century, while the last of them was Oyer Olazabal who left Barcelona in 2014 and played with Espanyol between 2020-2022.
8- The first Juan in the last 20 years
When he participates for the first time with Barcelona, he will be the 33rd player who plays for Barcelona in the name of “Juan” and the first since the former Espanyol player, Juan Verdo, who played in the 2004-2005 season.
9- Paris Olympiad 2024
Although he has not participated with the first Spanish national team, Juan Garcia has played with Spain at the youth level and was part of the under -23 squad that won the gold medal in the Paris 2024 Olympics.
10- familiar dressing room
The Barcelona dressing room will include at least familiar faces for the new goalkeeper such as Pao Cubarry, Firmin Lopez, and Eric Garcia, his former teammates in the Spanish Olympic team.
It seems that the arrival of Garcia to Barcelona will be held from the task of managing the goalkeepers of the Catalan club, where Garcia is competing with 3 goalkeepers for one position between the three woods and they are German Mark -Andre Ter Stegen, who hopes the team will accept a display of departure, and the Polish Vegsik Cheeseni and Inaki Benia.