Barça Femení Roll Call - Part II
Get to know the individual members of Barça Femení. In part 2, an introduction to the most relentless collection of apex predators in sports today.
Having realized I started this publication presuming that a majority of readers would be familiar with the players and personalities that make up this team, I decided to do a Barça Femení “roll call.”
About a week and a half ago, I started this exercise with an introduction to the goalkeepers, defenders, and a do-whatever’s-needed trio. We’re back today to wrap things up with the galaxy of stars that light up Barça Femení’s midfield and attack.
Note that, because of these players’ versatility and the positional fluidity with which this team plays, especially when on the front foot (so, like, all the time), neatly categorizing each player into a dedicated role was a bit tough. Hopefully, as you read through, the decision to place everyone where I did makes sense.
Middle of the Park
Patri Guijarro (#12)
As the first female player ever to get her education at La Masia, Patri was always going to be significant to Barça’s history. However, all she’s done since joining the club in 2015 as a 17-year-old from UD Collerense in her native Mallorca is destined to make that a footnote in her story.
Patri’s not only won every trophy of consequence with Barça but has done so with a rare combination of toughness and innate, nonchalant brilliance. Most impressively, in the wake of Alexia’s ACL injury, she stepped into the vacated midfield ”floor general” role, willingly and seamlessly, and led Barça to a second-ever Champions League crown, earning MVP honors in the final after scoring twice in three minutes to erase a 2-0 deficit.
She could easily have won the Ballon d’Or had she (along with Mapi León and Clàudia Pina) not opted out of the World Cup in protest of the subpar conditions and coaching provided to the Spanish women’s team by the RFEF. Even without the World Cup, probably deserved to finish higher than eighth.
Keira Walsh (#21)
One of the best young English players of the last decade, Walsh arrived at Barça from Man City in the summer of ‘22 as a freshly-crowned European champion (and Woman of the Match in the final at Wembley) with FA Women’s Super League, FA Cup, and League Cup winner’s medals already to her name.
Walsh is an exquisite passer…
… who’s fit in phenomenally at Barça almost since the moment of her arrival. Disciplined and hyper-intelligent, with a gift for winning 50/50 balls, creating space where there’s seemingly none, and influencing the game “while seemingly only brushing up against [it]” in a manner reminiscent of Sergio Busquets.
Esmee Brugts (#24)
The latest in a long line of rising Dutch stars to wind up in Barcelona. However, unlike Cruyff, Neeskins, Koeman, and Frenkie de Jong (among many others), Brugts is not a product of the vaunted Ajax youth setup. Rather, in moving to Catalunya from PSV Eindhoven at 20 years of age she shares a path with another gifted one-time Barça attacker: Ronaldo Nazario.
Unlike Ronaldo, however, Brugts hasn’t immediately been called upon to be a frontline star. Flanked by in-their-prime megastars at every turn, she’s got the luxury of easing into this side.
However, given her technical nuance, intelligence, and excellent ball-striking as both a passer and a shooter, it’s only a matter of time before she’s featuring more prominently.
Up Front
Bruna Vilamala (#19)
A prized La Masia product whose progress was derailed by an October 2021 ACL injury. Bruna joined La Masia in 2013 at just eleven years of age, rose through the ranks, and made her first-team debut at 17 in February 2020.
Before her injury, the second ACL tear of her career (the first came in 2018), she was the team’s second-best per-game scorer in the 2020-21 league season with 12 goals in 15 matches.
She’s shown flashes since her return but hasn’t consistently recaptured the form that had her pegged for stardom. She’s still just 21 years old and only a year removed from her return to action, so there’s reason for optimism. At the moment, however, she just offers some quality squad depth.
Vicky López (#30)
It’s hard to stand out in a team packed with precocious superstars, in a club with a history of precocious superstars. Yet that’s exactly what Vicky continues to do.
From speed to quickness to agility to intelligence, excellent dribbling, and two-foot finishing, Vicky’s got every attribute (besides perhaps height) that one looks for in an attacker.
Born in Madrid in July 2006 to a Spanish father and a Nigerian mother, she established herself as a star in Madrid CFF’s youth setup. In 2021-22, despite taking part in just 17 matches, she not only led the youth league in scoring but her sixty goals more than doubled the next-highest individual tally.
She’s since made her senior debut just six weeks after her 15th birthday, led Spain to a second-ever/second straight U-17 Women’s World Cup in 2022 as the tournament’s Golden Ball winner, and was named best player of the 2023 U-17 Euros, where Spain finished second.
All this and not a word about Barça!
Since joining the club in 2022, López has broken Patri’s record for the youngest-ever senior Barça Femení goalscorer, Ansu Fati’s mark for the youngest-ever senior goalscorer for FC Barcelona (since broken by Lamine Yamal), become the youngest-ever Clásico goalscorer, and remains one of the club’s youngest-ever senior debutants, behind Yamal and Clàudia Pina.
However you slice it, Vicky’s one of the top young talents in the sport. If anything, she could stand to be a bit more assertive and precocious on the pitch. Though, at just 17 on a team so thoroughly stocked with elite talent, a bit of deference is understandable.
Asisat Oshoala (#20)
On paper, the five-time African Women’s Footballer of the Year, three-time African Women’s Champion, Golden Boot/Ball in the 2014 U-20 Women’s World Cup, and the African Confederation’s Best Woman Player of the last decade, and winner of every club title of consequence with Barça is on her way to another outstanding season. Six goals in eight Liga F and Champions League matches, though not quite the 20-in-19 form that earned her co-Pichichi honors in 2021-22 but not far off last season’s 21-in-28 (plus five in nine in the Champions League) pace that landed her in the top-20 in Ballon d’Or voting for a second straight year.
For a second straight season, however, the eye test suggests the results may be a tad misleading. It’s a testament to Oshoala’s sublime vision and reading of the game that, even in a side that’s seemingly never not threatening, her ability to identify a scoring opportunity is conspicuous. This, ironically, works against her.
It’s genuinely crazy how often Oshoala finds herself in a “just put it in the bank” situation in front of goal. Given her incredible scoring record throughout her career, it’s similarly wild how many of these opportunities that begin with Oshoala staring down a helpless goalkeeper, often in isolation, end with the ball either smashing off of the keeper or trickling wide of the net.
At a similar point last season, she put together a spectacular three-hat-tricks-and-ten-goals-in-four-matches to right the ship. Three goals in two matches over four days between November 11 and 14, including this spectacular effort…
… will certainly help but, with an ever-deepening roster of goal-scorers around her, a contract that expires in June 2024, and zero action in the two highest-profile matches of the season thus far, the 29-year-old may actually need to put together another unconscious run to save her spot with the Blaugrana.
Salma Paralluelo (#7)
The apparent successor to Oshoala’s “goal-scorer first, second, and usually third” mantle.
In a second (and characteristically self-referential) mention of young Ronaldo Nazario - with intelligence, instinct, sublime skill, and an attack mode that never even flickers, Salma has the “full complement of strikerly attributes.” Plus a dash of extra special “something.”
It’s thus not been a massive shock to see 21-year-old zoom to the top of the list of the world’s strikers.
In terms of personality, fit and on-pitch production, Salma’s 2022-23 season was a monumental success. As great as 12 goals and five assists in 25 league and Champions League games as not-a-full-time-starter is, the numbers undersell her impact as both a top-tier attacker and a looming threat.
The summer offered Salma a chance to further burnish her reputation as one of the sport’s imminent greats. After three starts and two excellent performances (albeit with no goal contributions) in La Roja’s three World Cup group stage games and round-of-16 trouncing of Switzerland in New Zealand (Spain didn’t play in Australia until the final), as a second half on each occasion, Salma scored a 111th-minute winner in the quarterfinals against the Dutch and the opener in a 2-1 semifinal victory over Sweden. For her trouble, she received not only a winner’s medal but also Young Player of the Tournament.
Add it all up and you wind up with a third-place Ballon d”Or finish which, naturally, she celebrated with a four-goal haul in the first half of action after the ceremony.
The write-up for the next three, and conceivably all five remaining players could consist simply of shrug emojis and some version of “eh, what is there to say?” Conversely, I wouldn't have to strain much to give you 1,500 words on each player.
In the interest of our time and the integrity of this exercise, I'll try to land somewhere in the middle.
Alexia Putellas (#11)
Seriously, though, what is there to say about Alexia?
Certain people are seemingly made for a particular time, place, and moment. Alexia is one such person.
It’s difficult to avoid veering into hyperbole when trying to sum up Alexia’s on-pitch excellence and social and cultural impact. At the same time, it’s actually kinda tough to exaggerate her impact on this team, FC Barcelona, and the sport at large.
The history of women's football has no shortage of spectacular superstars. it has no shortage of ruthless competitors. It has no shortage of strong, charismatic characters. And yet, it’s tough to think of many (any?) players from the history of the game not just better suited but seemingly custom-crafted for this stage and these moments.
Alexia’s the platonic ideal of the era-defining superstar. On the pitch, she’s a big ball of fundamentals powered by an innate genius and a gift for nonchalant spectacularity. Off the pitch, she’s charming, thoughtful, honest, and vulnerable - and yet guarded and private. She oozes superstardom…
… but genuinely doesn't seem to crave the spotlight.
Is Alexia “the most important women's football player of all time?” Who knows. Frankly, parsing where she ranks on such a list really doesn’t interest me. What’s most important is that she happened at all and has helped open the door to greater acclaim and compensation, and improved working conditions.
On a final, more practical note: as we've covered here, since returning last spring from the ACL injury that cost her most of last season, particularly since the start of this season, Alexia’s moved up front into something between a “traditional” and “false” #9. That she'll succeed in this role is almost certainly a given. It is worth noting, however, that, even before the (seemingly, hopefully) minor injury that's cost her the last couple of games, there’s been a period of adjustment, to some extent to her new role but also to fully recapturing the fearlessness with which she’s always played.
Weaponized Wherever
Caroline Graham Hansen (#10)
Sandwiched between the newly-crowned Ballon d’Or winner and the winner of the award the previous two seasons is the actual best player on Earth right now.
If writing about Alexia is “really tough” summing up CGH is a full-blown mindfuck.
I’ve referred to her as a “sorceress” and “a genius chuckling at the punchline to a joke that only she understands” who “does the spectacular as well and as nonchalantly as anyone” and “makes the angels sing.”
No individual here better embodies the “stuck in a torture chamber” feeling that accompanies playing this team. Meeting CGH on the right flank is like being stranded on an island with a dazzling, beguiling assassin who leaves no real options beyond wishful flailing.
Before I start rambling, beyond pointing out that hopefully, one day, someone, somewhere, will at least include this woman on a (no-so short) shortlist for awards for which she’s probably soon going to be overqualified, I will say simply this:
If the need ever arises while I am on the right flank of a football pitch I would, without a word, allow Caroline Graham Hansen to perform surgery on me.
Aitana Bonmatí (#14)
Shall we all just shrug again?
I’ve spilled an awful lot of words about Barça’s latest Ballon d’Or winner in recent weeks. I still feel like I’m searching for the short, sweet, simple summation of what makes Aitana such a special player. The best I’ve come up with thus far is this: Aitana is maximizing being the peak version of the player she’s trying to be.
I recognize this is a bit unclear, if not incoherent. Let’s try it like this: at her peak, Alexia is in the tiny tier of “best players to ever play.” But it feels like she chases ghosts. Even at her pre-injury apex, she seemed haunted by the pursuit of a standard that no one can meet. CGH, meanwhile - with whom Aitana shares an incredible mid-meld in one of sports’ great 1-2 punches - for as intelligent, focused, refined, and ruthlessly, torturously competitive as she is, innately oozes obscene talent in a manner befitting the #10 Barça shirt.
Aitana is a hybrid of the two: a playground for a preternatural skill set that often feels like it possesses her and a viciously competitive local talisman that's abundantly aware of her place within this team, this club, and the sport. But, even in the face of what are obviously ridiculous standards to which she holds herself, she seems, I dunno… not haunted?
A constant delight to watch and privilege to witness.
Mariona Caldentey (#9)
Another Mallorquina who came up through the Collerense youth setup. The quick thinking, precise passing, outstanding dribbling and ball control - especially in close quarters - that she developed playing futsal in her youth have provided Mariona with incredible versatility. Though originally a midfielder, she’s now equally adept at playing #9 (false or traditional) and on the wings. Just as importantly, her toughness, passion, and tactical awareness, combined with one hell of an infectious smile, have made Mariona the unheralded heart of this side.
Though not a La Masia product (she signed with the club in July 2014, at 18 years of age), Mariona’s a Barça lifer in her own right. Her father, who sadly passed away in 2018, was not only a coach and lifelong Barça fan but also a prominent member of one of FC Barcelona’s biggest penyes.
Clàudia Pina (#6)
Another former futsal player (from just north of Barcelona), Pina joined Espanyol’s youth setup in 2011 at age 10. Two years later, however, she moved across town to La Masia, where, in her second season, with the infantil-alevín (age 12-13) side, she appeared in 20 games… and scored 100 goals. When 16-year-5-month-old Pina debuted for the senior side in January 2018, she was the youngest player to ever play for a senior Barça team in an official match.
As innately gifted as anyone on this team, when she’s at her best and the team’s flowing, Pina is as voracious an attacker as the game has to offer - “arguably the most innately ruthless attacker on Murderers’ Row,” if you will. What’s equally striking and delightful about the Clàudia Pina experience, however, is that, like CGH (and to a lesser extent Aitana) at her best, she too is seemingly a conduit for an innate talent that cannot be possessed.
This talent took center stage on that magical night in March 2022, in front of 91,500, at 2-2 in a Champions League elimination game against Real Madrid, when then-19-year-old Pina, after breaking up a Fridolina Rolfö cross-field pass by inadvertently running into its path, calmly collected the ball at the left corner of the box, and lofted an audacious, inch-perfect shot into the top right.
To even try this on that stage takes unfathomable gall. To pull it off this perfectly suggests you’re playing a different game.