When Mariona Caldentey was a student, reading sports science at university, she could see the Camp Nou scoreboard from her bedroom window on the top floor of 63 Travessera de les Corts. On the nights when she and her flatmates didn’t stroll across to the stadium, they would hear goals before they saw them on TV. They played too, becoming league champions, but never imagined themselves over there. “Our reality was Astroturf pitches with no stands,” she recalls.
Yet in April 2022, eight years on, 91,648 people came to watch them, breaking Barcelona’s own world record set a fortnight before. “It all happened so quick; one day we’ll realise what we achieved, all we did for change to come,” she says.
The building has gone, demolished with the construction work at the stadium, but someone should put a blue plaque where it stood. When Caldentey arrived from Felanitx, Mallorca, just turned 18, she shared the sobreático with Virginia Torrecilla and Alexia Putellas. Patri Guijarro, Laia Codina and Aitana Bonmatí came too. Together, over a decade, they built perhaps the best team in history, quadruple winners last season. Caldentey departed for Arsenal last summer after 10 seasons, a World Cup winner and Ballon d’Or candidate, with nothing left to win.
At 29 there is though plenty left to do, experiences to live, an impact to make. So here she is, sitting in a quiet second-floor office at London Colney. Friday afternoon traffic builds on the M25 outside; otherwise, Arsenal’s training ground is ideal. It reflects the reasons she came, the seemingly surprising decision to depart a perfect team. So too does the stadium, a little further from Caldentey’s St Albans home than the Camp Nou was back then.
Caldentey will be at the Emirates Stadium on Wednesday to face Real Madrid, a Champions League semi-final at stake. Arsenal are 2-0 down from the first leg, an unfamiliar result against familiar opponents who Caldentey had beaten in all 16 previous meetings, but these are the challenges she came for. And if there is a portrait of what moved her, it is partly provided by place, the first leg played in front of 3,102 people at Valdebebas with its two small stands and a sodden surface; the second held at the Emirates, where she has her own song to the tune of Twist and Shout. “At home, with our people, a pitch in good condition, we have another chance,” she says.
“I couldn’t say the exact moment I decided to go; you change your mind every day,” Caldentey says. “You can think you’re mad to even contemplate leaving but it’s a very personal feeling, hard to explain. It was all transparent, calmly handled, I was able to focus on competing. And in the end, it was perfect. It was like: we’ve done it, I can go in peace. Arsenal was the right place.”
That “We’ve done it” goes deep. It wasn’t just the winning, departure announced with another European title and a fifth consecutive league medal round her neck, it was how, what it meant, who they were and where they came from. It is there in that flat, not bought or appropriated but built, a model to follow; one based on conviction, a cause, the social impact as satisfying as the success. Some of what Caldentey says is manifesto as well as memory. “It’s lovely when a parent tells you their son or daughter see you as an inspiration because when we were girls women’s football was invisible,” she says.
“Barcelona have marked an era. The club professionalised women’s football in 2015. We went four, five years without winning the league, but they kept going, backing us – and then came the dominance. We reached finals, were made to look foolish, were hit by reality, and carried on, improved. The team that won was built on defeats, too.
“It would have been easy to throw in the towel. But Barcelona stood firm, and that’s an example for other clubs in Spain. There’s talent there, take care of it. If you only half back it, when it’s not going well you’ll pull out. There are lots of examples. It was [Madrid’s] Melanie Leupolz who said some clubs back women’s football to get results and others wait for results before they back it. Barcelona have shown that if you truly do, if you believe, it can bring benefits, including at a business level. The accounts show that: it’s one of the few or the only sección at Barcelona that doesn’t run at a loss. In fact, it makes money. It’s numbers. It’s there. Women’s football can be profitable if you treat it well and sell it well.”
Which is also where England comes in. Much was made of Real Madrid’s arrival in 2019, one front page declaring women’s football had entered into a “new dimension”. Yet the “clásico”, if it should be called that, has not always been a real rivalry or the main event, the Catalans too often standing alone. When Madrid beat Barcelona 3-1 last weekend, it was the first time, after 18 consecutive defeats, aggregate score 66-7. Barcelona have won the past five titles by nine, 25, 24, 10 and 15 points. Their goal differences read: +80, +152, +148, +108, +127.
But it’s not about Spain being too easy and Caldentey insists “no one gets tired of winning”, although she does call the dominance “brutal and absolute”; it’s about something broader, across the league and society. When Arsenal went to Chelsea, 34,302 people went. At Spurs it was 28,852. “It’s hard to compare ‘Spain and England’ because there are two different realities there: Barcelona and the rest. My feeling is that here it’s every stadium, every team. It’s a different culture, the league’s competitive. They made the most of having the Euros and winning it, that boom. That’s was missing in Spain after the World Cup. What happened away from football happened and I don’t know if that eclipsed [the title], but what England did to help women’s football explode, Spain didn’t do. It feels like not much has changed.”
In September 2023, 15 Spanish players, including Caldentey, made themselves unavailable for selection for the national team, demanding changes at the federation and a more determined backing of the women’s game. Some changes happened, if not enough for everyone. Eventually, Caldentey was one of three of the 15 recalled for the World Cup. During the celebrations, the federation president Luis Rubiales kissed Jenni Hermoso, unsolicited; last month he was found guilty of sexual assault.
“I’m relieved it’s over. Relief, that’s it,” Caldentey says. “In the end, there was more repercussion for everything that happened than Spain winning the World Cup. The first title that the national team won, and it was all … well, tarnished.”
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Yet there was a redemption, a justification, in success. “Winning the World Cup was a fist on the desk. Are you waiting for success to truly back it, or do you back it to allow success to come? That was the battle. We could be the best. What we need[ed] was to be supported, given the tools, listened to … Winning the World Cup showed we weren’t niñatas caprichosas.”
Roughly, that means spoilt brats, and it hurts. “It was a lot of suffering but if it allows a better future, we hold on to that.”
A sadness is left too, a personal dimension to it revealed when Caldentey discusses how the group divided: the distrust, tension, broken relationships, silences. Five weeks in New Zealand ended with the trophy but were endured, not enjoyed. Then she had to return to a Barcelona dressing room shared with teammates who had missed the greatest moment of their lives.
“In England [at the Euros], we were good [together] and didn’t win. Then we go to the World Cup and win. It’s no secret the [Spain] dressing room wasn’t united. When we trained or played, we had the same objective, but things had happened that hurt the group and we had to live with that 24/7. It’s hard. [Back] in Barcelona, we managed that situation. We kept winning, tried to ensure it didn’t affect the team, but everyone suffered their own way, in their feelings and thoughts.”
Does coming here allow you to leave all that behind, to clear your head? “In the end, you’re distanced from all that. Further away, focused on other things.” The smile returns. “I’m here at Arsenal now and I’m enjoying it loads,” Caldentey says.
She knew expectations would be high. “Can I be at a great level in another context? Can I show what I am? A lot of games at Barcelona were against a low block: attack, attack, attack, league games where we hardly had to defend. It was more tactical. Here, it’s more open, more transitory, bigger distances, space. It’s more physical, the football’s more mad, out of control. I don’t know how many games we’ve finished 4-3.
“And,” Caldentey says, smiling, “I like that. Anything different I can add makes me more complete.”
She is confident Arsenal can turn it around against Madrid. And then, if they do, maybe they can face Barcelona. Caldentey smiles. “Hopefully,” she says. “Because it would mean we’ve reached the final. It’s some way off and we have to beat Madrid first but I’d sign up for that right now.” A reunion for some of the former residents of No 63 Travessera de les Corts.