Marques' Emotional Farewell After 12 Years at Barça
After 12 years in blaugrana, Marques has closed the door on his Barcelona chapter with a raw, emotional farewell that underlined just how deeply the club has shaped his life.
The midfielder, who joined Barça at the age of eight and eventually realised his dream of debuting for the first team against Mallorca in February 2026, turned to Instagram to say goodbye to the club he openly calls “the club of my life”.
He didn’t dress it up. He didn’t pretend it was easy.
“After 12 years, the time has come to say goodbye to the club that has watched me grow up since I was eight,” he wrote, reflecting on a journey that has taken him from La Masia hopeful to first‑team footballer. Every step, he insisted, had mattered: “Every season, every training session, every match, every trip, every victory.”
But he made sure the story wasn’t just about the bright lights. Marques laid bare the other side of elite development – “the toughest moments, the injuries, and the times filled with doubt and suffering” – and credited those setbacks with shaping the player and person he has become. “All of them taught me valuable lessons and helped me get to where I am today,” he said.
That destination, for him, was clear: pulling on the Barça first-team shirt. He described making his debut as the fulfilment of a dream he had chased “for so many years”, one he “never imagined” would come true when he first walked through the doors as a child. Those minutes with the senior side, he said, created “unforgettable, unique moments” he will carry forever.
The message then widened out. Marques reeled off the people who had carried him through a dozen demanding seasons: “all the coaches, team-mates (many of whom have become great friends), physios, doctors, staff members, and everyone who has been by my side over these past 12 years.” Each of them, he stressed, had “played a part in shaping the player and the person I am today.”
He reserved a special line for those closest to him. “Thanks also to my family – especially my parents and sisters – my partner, and my friends, who have supported and stood by me unconditionally, helping to make this dream a reality.” The badge, he added, had never been taken lightly: “I have worn this badge on my chest with great pride all these years, and I always will.”
Then came the hardest admission. Leaving, he said, hurts.
“I won’t deny that it hurts to leave,” Marques confessed, making clear that the timing and manner of his exit had caught him off guard. “The way this moment has arrived was unexpected, and it is not how I had imagined saying goodbye to the club of my life.” Yet he framed his decision as one born from love and professional necessity, calling it a painful but needed step for his development and insisting that his affection for Barça includes understanding and respecting the decisions made around him over the years.
He departs with no bitterness in his words, only gratitude and a sense of closure. “I leave with the peace of mind of having given my all,” he wrote, convinced he has honoured the shirt and the dream he fought to reach.
The letter ended as it began: with Barcelona at the centre of everything. “Barça has given me everything. Thank you for these 12 years. Thank you for helping me grow, for teaching me, for challenging me, and for allowing me to live a dream – at the club of my life – that I will remember forever. Long live Barca, always.”
A boy who arrived at eight, a man who leaves after a first-team debut and a lifetime of academy memories. The next chapter belongs to Marques now – but he has made it clear that wherever he goes, Barça goes with him.
