by Aitana Bonmatí looked distraught and you could be forgiven for thinking she was on the losing side. Hands on the side of her head, eyes closed, face screwed up. But then you look at her movement and energy and it gives away the real story; along with the reduced players in blue that she is running away from. As Spain’s mercurial midfielder heads towards teammate Mariona Caldentey, England’s Millie Bright stands with her hands on her hips, Georgia Stanway leans forward, hands on her knees, and Alex Greenwood adjusts her hair above the bandage heavy from the injury she picked up in the middle of the field. match.
They are the best of the World Cup winners in Spain, a fighting team that went towards getting the best on the pitch despite long and tough battles, and Bonmatí herself, the unplayable engine of Spain and Barcelona, who achieved the best. the year moved past her club and country colleague Alexia Putellas and was noted as the best in the world.
It’s no surprise that Bonmatí is sitting at Number 1 on the Guardian’s list of the 100 best female footballers. The only small upset is that 10 of the 112 judges, made up of former players, managers and journalists from around the world, were not in her No. added Sam Kerr.
Going back to the summer of 2022, it was the misfortune of Putellas being struck down with an ACL injury on the eve of the Euros that helped propel Bonmatí forward, although many have long considered her the day as the unsung hero. of Barcelona and Spain. Without Putellas, however, the Catalan wizard needed to help plug the gap – as well as add leadership and goals to increase their threat.
Although Bonmatí was operating in the shadow of Putellas, a two-time Ballon d’Or winner, she was not noticed. After the smart midfielder was sent off in the U-20 World Cup semi-final, wearing the captain’s armband, meaning she missed out on Spain’s defeat to Japan in the final, former Barcelona and Spain international Xavi, who is now the manager of the Barcelona men. The team told Fifa: “She reminds me of me, because we understand football in the same way. Football is about using your brain. If you put talent against physicality, talent will always win, because that’s the essence of football.”
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Her idol, the player on whom she modeled her game so passionately, wrote the introduction to her autobiography and said that “he excites me, he gets me out of my seat”. He then prophetically announced: She has all the ingredients to be the best player in the world because, on top of everything, she is a true perfectionist. Her mental strength will determine how far she can go.”
Every time Bonmatí stood on the pitch, from when she was the only girl out of 400 playing for her local side CD Ribes, to the World Cup final, she has attracted attention and imagination.
In the 2022-23 season the 25-year-old scored nine league goals and provided 10 assists as Barcelona won Liga F and, in the Champions League, added five goals as they set their sights on a second European title , although they were frightened. in the final at Wolfsburg. This season she has already scored six goals and provided five goals for Liga F and has scored three goals in the Champions League.
But goals and assists don’t tell the full story of Bonmatí’s impact: she controls games with clever assassination, toying with the pace of games, picking out the most unpredictable passes with an unrivaled awareness of the spaces that open and close around her.
All his success in 2023 has been set against the backdrop of turmoil. For a good part of the year Bonmatí did not play for his country, one of “Las 15”, the 15 players who wrote to the Spanish Football Federation saying that the environment around the national team was affecting their health. She was drowned from the side with her 14 companions. The midfielder was one of three who returned to the squad for the World Cup.
The manager, Jorge Vilda, had been backed by the Spanish FA and was still in force in Australia and New Zealand but with each victory en route to the final he cut a more remote figure. After the win the players celebrated separately from the team.
Her parents, Rosa Bonmatí Guidonet and Vicente Conca i Ferràs, who were both teachers, brought her up to understand what it means to fight back. Her father was a campaigner for the Movement for the Defense of the Land, a coalition of socialist organizations pushing for the independence of Catalonia, and both were leading members of the movement demanding a change to the law that said children had to be named taking her father’s and mother’s name first. second.
They were so outraged by the law that, after being told they were not allowed to have Bonmatí first, they agreed to have her mother register her as a single parent, leaving Aitana a child with only one last name . Bonmatí was two when the law was changed, thanks to her parents’ fight, and the young Catalan was one of the first people in Spain to have her mother’s surname before her father’s.
In her Ballon d’Or speech, delivered in a mix of Spanish, Catalan and English, she thanked her parents for encouraging her commitment to struggle. “You fought for change, and you succeeded,” she said. “I have that fight and recovery in my blood.”
She also spoke about the wider role played by female footballers, adding, in English, at the end of her speech: “As role models, we have a responsibility on and off the field. We should be more than athletes. We should lead by example and continue to fight together for a better, peaceful and equal world.”
Yes, Bonmatí is a generational talent on the field, but he is also an increasingly influential leader, a man who will be winning honors in both of those spots for many years to come.
