Half an hour ahead. 0-0. Jorge Vilda calls Salma Paralluelo. The coach is looking for the reaction Spain needs to overcome a resilient Sweden and seal their ticket to the final. The plan does not fail. Just as she did against the Netherlands in the quarterfinals, the entrance of the Barça striker completely transforms the game and a few minutes after being on the field she is already celebrating, with arms outstretched, a new target. A disconnection –again reliving the match against the Dutch– allowed Sweden to get into the match almost immediately, but the story ended well for the red thanks to Olga Carmona’s blow in the last minute of the game. The referee whistles. Spain is in the World Cup final for the first time in its history. The players run to hug each other, cry…Salma Paralluelo takes a breath and lets out a long sigh.
You still can’t believe what you just got. They are in the final. The first end. Although the one on Sunday (12 noon) in Sydney, against the winner of today’s Australia-England match (12 noon) will not be the first World Cup final for the FC Barcelona winger. At the age of 19, Salma Paralluelo (Zaragoza, 2003), is the U-17 and U-20 world champion and only has to be crowned with the majors to complete a golden triplet.
With the sub-17, under the command of Toña Is, Paralluelo was part of a squad that made history by winning the first World Cup title for a women’s team in Spain. A team that also included Cata Coll, Claudia Pina and Eva Navarro.
The Aragonese is experiencing her first major tournament with the senior team in Australia and New Zealand, after a soleus injury left her out of Jorge Vilda’s final list. It was the great surprise of the coach’s list, which had never before called Paralluelo for a concentration. His place, coincidentally, was taken by Tere Abelleira, another of the figures that is standing out in this World Cup. At 19 years and 275 days, Salma Paralluelo has become the second youngest footballer to score in a World Cup, only behind Canadian Kara Lang in 2003, aged 16 years and 348 days.
It has been a fixture of Jorge Vilda throughout the tournament, and one of the few that has played every game. She started the first four rounds, but it has been coming off the bench in the last two qualifiers when she has become the most decisive. She entered at 71 against the Netherlands, to sign the winning goal at 111 and yesterday she came out at 57 and opened the can at 81.
In both, in addition, she has been recognized as the best footballer of the match. A Salma Paralluelo who came to New Zealand to enter among the most promising young stars of the World Cup, but who has gone from promise to revelation of the tournament.
With a Spanish father and an Equatorial Guinean mother, the footballer from Zaragoza made her senior debut at the end of the year in a friendly against Argentina. She made her debut with ownership and scoring a hat trick. Four months earlier, she had signed for FC Barcelona and made the most important decision of her career: leaving athletics. At Villarreal she combined -and shone- in both disciplines, until the call from the giant blaugrana pushed her to choose.
It has been a year of adaptation, both mentally and physically, for a body that was not used to training exclusively in football, nor at the very high level of the Catalan team, which drew up a personalized plan to adapt to this new reality. He has had to deal with muscular problems all season, but this has not prevented him from shining, nor from starting in the Champions League final that FC Barcelona won against Wolfsburg on June 3 in Eindhoven.
Now, he dreams of putting the finishing touch to a dream season. At the moment, he has already contributed with two decisive goals in the last two games. The last one, with the right, as suggested by Aitana Bonmatí, who always encourages her to shoot with her less skilled leg so that she is a more complete footballer. “The goal has been a magical moment, of joy, you always think that it is something punctual, singular, and with being able to repeat it I feel very grateful, very proud,” recalled the Aragonese yesterday, who remembered her family and all the people who has supported you. 90 minutes from glory, Salma Paralluelo does not want to stop here: “We have one last push left”, she encourages her.
