Manchester United's Marcus Rashford will spend the 2025/26 season on loan at Barcelona under the watchful eye of head coach Hansi Flick.
The Catalan club will have the option to purchase the England international permanently after a high-profile fall-out with Man United boss Ruben Amorim.
Rashford has made over 400 appearances for the Old Trafford club, scoring 138 times, but his latest loan move could spell the end of his storied chapter representing the Red Devils.
Marcus Rashford joins an exclusive club of Brits to sign for Bara
The 27-year-old was dropped from the Man United squad midway through last season subsequently joining Aston Villa on loan until the end of the campaign. He scored two league goals for the Villans, adding six assists across all competitions, including in the UEFA Champions League.
Rashford follows in the footsteps of another former Man United striker who appeared for Los Culs during the late-1980s. Well-travelled football manager Mark Hughes joined the LaLiga giants in 1986 but struggled to settle, eventually moving to Bayern Munich on loan.
In 1988, Hughes returned to Old Trafford, where he would remain for another seven years.
Many on social media have suggested Rashford will be the first Englishman to turn out for Barcelona since Gary Lineker, who enjoyed a more successful spell at Camp Nou than Hughes during the same period. However, they would be wrong to suggest Rashford is the first Englishman on Barcelona's books since the 1986 FIFA World Cup Golden Boot winner.
Football League supporters, namely those belonging to Oxford United and Bristol City, may be more familiar with Barcelona's most recent Englishman.
In January 2018, Hale End academy graduate Marcus McGuane swapped Arsenal's youth ranks for the Barcelona 'B' squad in Spain's Segunda Divisin, signing a contract which included a 25 million release clause.
While Lineker's three-year stint saw him score 52 goals in 138 appearances before returning to English shores with Tottenham Hotspur, McGuane made only a single senior appearance for Barcelona. This came in the Supercopa de Catalunya, a competition arranged by the Catalan Football Federation open to teams based in the autonomous region of Catalonia, which includes Barcelona, Girona and Espanyol.
McGuane made 24 appearances for the 'B' team before joining Nottingham Forest on a permanent transfer. Shortly thereafter, the ex-Arsenal youngster signed for Oxford, making over 100 league appearances at the Kassam Stadium and has since moved on, joining defeated Championship play-off semi-finalists Bristol City in 2024.
Another English youngster, currently playing in the EFL, was on Barcelona's books as a scholar. Louie Barry made the move to Camp Nou from West Bromwich Albion's academy at the age of 16 in 2019, signing a three-year deal. Barry was an Under-19 league champion with Barcelona and appeared in the UEFA Youth League but left the club following the outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic, moving closer to home with Aston Villa.
Barry is currently on loan at Sheffield United following a successful spell with Stockport County. He has also appeared for Ipswich Town, Swindon Town, MK Dons, Salford City and Hull City.
