It is one of the three vertices that form the triangle of the Spanish team. Alexia Putellas and Jenni Hermoso are the other two. Before closing a perfect week, Irene Paredes (Legazpi, 1991) attends ELMUNDO to analyze not only the rival, France, against whom they could obtain their second title with the national team, but also the current situation of the national team after the Rubiales earthquake .

What a week they would close if they beat France, they have gone 13 games without losing. Hopefully, that's what we want. They are among the best in the world, they have been able to win titles for many years and, for whatever reason, they are not doing it, but due to ability it is not. I think they really want to win their first title and it's going to be a great game.. Both teams are doing well.. From his time at PSG he will know them well. Yes, I have played with some and I have had the rest as rivals, so it is a team that I know quite well even though we have not faced them in years. What situation is the team in today? Good, well prepared physically and emotionally. Trusting the team because we know what we are capable of. Also very aware of the difficulty of playing these games because the other day we did very well, but there are many things that were done wrong and sometimes the small details can leave you out.. We are calm, trusting the team a lot, but knowing that it is going to be a very difficult game. Do you think that with Montse Tomé stability has come to the national team? We have been focusing away from football for a long time and little by little we are returning to it , which is what we want and what we are for. Still: Oliva, Alexia's call, the change of headquarters…. The controversy follows them, why? There has been nonsense and not nonsense, but it is true that there are things that we do not have to go into. We want to focus on playing, we come here to perform and the rest is noise that we have to escape from.

Despite the noise, world champions and qualified for the Olympic Games. There are many reasons to smile. That is there and we have been talking for a long time about something that until recently was unthinkable.. Inside the locker room we had a lot of confidence and we knew we could do it, but we didn't end up doing it, especially in important games.. We are achieving it now and we want it to continue. How do they manage to perform with everything that has surrounded them? In the end what we like is to play. When you're on the field you forget everything and that's what makes you enjoy it and the better you do it's like you go into a loop, you get more excited and you want to improve yourself.. We have a very competitive team, we all want to be better every day and that is showing. I think Jenni said that they were an unrepeatable generation, do you agree with her? It could be. I trust that from now on the girls who come will believe that this is just the beginning, but it is true that it is difficult to improve on today's generation. Tell me about the photo of you with Jenni and Alexia in La Cartuja after qualifying for the Olympic Games. We have been together for many years.. From the beginning we have experienced all the change, we have gone through very difficult circumstances inside and being able to have such beautiful moments as winning a World Cup or qualifying for the Games makes us especially excited and it is something very cool to share it with them.

Her performance is incredible and even more so that of Jenni, who has experienced this whole whirlwind the most. How does she manage it? She has suffered and suffers a lot. What happens is that she has made a very big armor for herself and has surrounded herself with people who It has helped him manage everything very well. In the end what she likes is to play soccer, where she doesn't remember anything, she escapes, she shows her magic and that's what frees her, but it's amazing how she performs with her whole situation. When she retires, What will you tell your son with more pride, the star he achieved or the fact that he led the change in women's football, #SeAcabó? I don't think he remembers anything, but I will remind him that he was a key player in the World Cup. He was with the team and brought us a lot of happiness. I will also explain to him what needs to be explained to him, but I trust that there are many situations that sound like a movie, that by the time he is older, things will have changed.. At the moment it seems normal to him and he watches a lot more girls' football than boys' football, so I hope he grows up in a different reality. About everything that happened in the past, do you regret anything or would you have done it differently? No, I think things happen always for something and you have to accept them and move forward. She is 32 years old and speaks with the poise of a veteran. I think I have always been quite sensible and thorough. I think a lot about everything I do and I think it's the best. Origins Tell me about your football origins in Legazpi? I come back often because I have family, friends and I like it. Many times it is a refuge where I feel safe and calm.. They are my beginnings, it is where I started and I remember it with great affection, although football was difficult. I played since I can remember and until I was 14 I couldn't play on a team because there were no girls.. So, I always played in the street. That has changed and I like to return to the town and see how there are more girls' teams and it is increasingly encouraged.. Furthermore, I have a campus in the summer and I am especially excited to contribute that grain of sand. At those ages, who did I dream of being? I was very much a Real Sociedad fan and I saw the kids, but I didn't dream of being anyone because I knew I wasn't a posibility. So, when there is no possibility, you don't dream of being anything like that, or playing football, or being a professional or anything.. These are doors that have been opened to me later.. And hence the importance of making us visible, that it is normalized and that all those girls see that you can be a professional soccer player and win a World Cup or play in the Olympic Games.. The more girls there are playing, the more the level will increase. The better those who arrive and play with the national team will be and the greater the spectacle will be.

It is needed in Spain because at Barça they are a roller. You can always improve. Although we are a reference, it is still difficult for girls to have equal opportunities, to be valued equally.. Well, there is work to do, but it is true that what is being done is very good and when you win it is true that you attract more people. With the national team already more than 100 games, who would have told you? When I started it seemed difficult. It has rained a little, but I am happy to have reached that figure and to be able to continue being part of this. How much glass is left to the roof of women's football? Yes, there is still a lot, but we are on the right track and we hope that it will be the start of good things. We focus on playing, on continuing to win, which is engaging and gives us reasons to continue pushing. Did you hear Rafa Nadal's words about salaries between boys and girls? What did you think? I prefer not to go into that conversation. Besides Paris, what are your plans for the summer? I haven't thought about it. Now we only have between our eyebrows to win on Wednesday. Then there will also be a list and the objective will be to be on it and arrive in good condition. What do you like to do outside of football? I really like spending time with Lucía, Mateo and the dog.. Relax a lot in nature, visit things, tranquility. Flash interview

When 15 players from the Spanish National Team raised their voices publicly, they were not the only ones in Europe. Other soccer players had paved the way to not tolerate more rudeness from their federations. It was the French, today Spain's rivals in the Nations League final, who began their revolution as soon as they fell in the quarterfinals of their World Cup in 2019.. It was not an easy process, nor did it bear immediate fruit.. They had to stumble again in the semifinals of the 2022 Euro Cup, stop wearing the national jersey and have the president of their Federation resign due to a shocking audit of their management.

The players' relationship with coach Corinne Diacre was poisoned almost from their arrival and exploded two years later, after the World Cup in France.. The veteran Gaëtane Thiney accused her of “infantilizing” the players and the French top scorer, Eugénie Le Sommer, together with the midfielder Amandine Henry, described the coach's management as “chaos.”. As a consequence, neither of them was already in the European Championship in England.

But the final blow was given six months before the World Cup in Australia by captain Wendie Renard, who had recovered in 2021 the bracelet that Diacre took from her when she came to the bench.. On February 24, he publicly announced that, at 32 years old, he was resigning from the national team, “because I can no longer support the current system far from the requirements required by the highest level,” explained the Olympique Lyon defense.. Four other important players joined her decision, such as: Katoto, Diani and Morroni, all three from PSG, and Mbock, Renard's teammate in Lyon.

From Arabia to the women's bench

This massive stance made the French Federation react, which in March fired Diacre, because “the fracture has reached an irreversible point that undermines the interests of the team,” and hired Hervé Renard, who had just left the Saudi Arabia national team. after giving the surprise with a victory against Leo Messi's Argentina.

With no experience in women's football, she led France to the quarterfinals, in which they lost on penalties to Australia and has proven intractable in the Nations League, where they have only conceded one draw and conceded two goals.

He has put together a lethal team in quick transitions that will leave the ball in the hands of Montse Tomé's players, who continue to have doubts from Tere Abelleira and Alexia Putellas despite the fact that they have already trained with the group. France loses, for personal reasons, Sandy Baltimore, who has been replaced by the young Vicky Becho.

The precedents are not good for the Spanish National Team: in 13 confrontations with the French they have only been able to get three draws. The last time Spain avoided defeat was in Euro 1997, a 1-1 draw that took the Spanish team, on goal difference, to the semifinals, the best result in European tournaments. Five years ago, in 2019, they met in a friendly that again ended in defeat (2-0).

Six later, Jenni Hermoso sat down again in a press room. A “stronger girl”, eager to play another final, this time against France. She does not deny that she has lived through “a long, hard process”, from which football has brought her back, but she does not forget that she missed the start of the Nations League due to the RFEF's desire to “protect” her. At least that's how it was explained then. “I was clear. I didn't understand it nor will I understand it. It hurt me, it will always hurt me, but it's over and for me the best thing is to be here again, wearing this shirt and in a final,” the player confessed.

Everything that happened has changed her “personally and as a footballer,” “but I am lucky to be able to experience a final again. We are privileged. I am happy and I feel good because football gives me the life I need,” she admits.

The selection has also changed. “It's more fluid, we have a clearer idea of the game we want to play and it's important that the player feels it, that she enjoys it on the field.”. I think we are more aware of what we can become. Before we didn't believe it so much. In that we have changed individually and as a group, what can I say if it has been shown that we are the best in the world,” she analyzed.

He tiptoed over his relationship with Montse Tomé after leaving her out of his first call, but was blunt when stating that “the group has always been united.”. Jenni Hermoso does not see a “ceiling” for this group. “Neither now nor the future, because very important young players are coming.

Hermoso did not stop remembering that they are another step away from making history again. “If we win, Spain will have done it again, the Spanish player will continue to advance in her projection because we are a mirror for the following generations,” he warned.

He knows France well. She met some of her players during her year in Paris, “an experience that didn't go well for me,” she acknowledged, and they all know that Les Bleus have resisted them for too long, but it is not an incentive to win this final. “We look forward to all the teams. I don't see myself leaving any other way. “It's the day to show that Spain won a World Cup,” said the goalscorer.

Tomé: “All 25 players are available”

Jenni Hermoso will be in Spain's eleven, but Montse Tomé will have to make two discards because, as she herself revealed, she already has the 25 players available. Tere Abelleira and Alexia Putellas have joined the group's work. “The work they have done has had a positive evolution. Yesterday they told me that 25 are available. Has it been agreed with Barça? It's something that I don't have to value.. “Alexia is well and focused,” he limited himself to acknowledging the coach, who is clear about how to create problems for France.

“We recognize ourselves as a team that wants to have the ball, that presses intensely and orderly. It is our hallmark. We want to have it right and know where to take it to do damage. In the Netherlands there were players who could make transitions for us and in France there are also very fast ones. We have to be attentive and attentive to these surveillances and transitions,” he warned.

In his footballers he does not see even a hint of relaxation after having qualified for the Paris Games. “It is impossible for us to be relaxed. Being in the Games was the goal we set for ourselves on the first day. The look of the footballers was exciting, but it is already achieved and now we compete in this final to win. We are surrounded by a lot of ambition and we have worked hard to be here,” he acknowledged..

“France is a great rival, we know its strengths, its weaknesses. We are all convinced that the team is not relaxed, but prepared and focused on what it must do.. “It's going to be a final with two very different essences of the game.”

Spain arrives with the experience of having played in a final while France is making its debut, but that will not give them an advantage. “We respect our rival a lot. In the entire classification it has been the team that has conceded the fewest goals but also the one that has scored the least despite having powerful players on the left wing, on the right wing…. We evaluate different scenarios depending on the structure they have. We can hurt them with the ball and take great care of ourselves to compensate for possible losses and avoid their quick exits. Being us, occupying the spaces, making them run without the ball, we can hurt them,” she noted.

If Spain were champions, and despite the fact that there are elections in the RFEF, Tomé could earn credit to sign his renewal and continue on the bench. “I don't think about her. This is the elite and I am focused only on the work we have been doing with my coaching staff,” he concluded. They know that, even though they are champions, their future is unknown.

Girona did not fail against Rayo. It was difficult for them to close the match, but, in the end, they ended up winning 3-0 with a goal from Tsygankov and a double from Savinho. All in the second half of a duel marked by an intense downpour on Montilivi and against a rival that ended with 10 due to the expulsion of Chavarría. With this result, the team consolidates itself a little more in second place and is looking more and more seriously at the possibility of entering the Champions League for the first time in its history.. For now, at least, the vertigo doesn't get the better of him.

The Girona team, under an intense downpour and against a Rayo team willing to defend itself tooth and nail in Montilivi, took a little longer than usual to feel comfortable. But, as soon as he achieved it, he began to arrive again and again to the area of a Dimitrievski who, in fact, was not very stretched. It was difficult for the locals to find clear options. The most, one from Yangel Herrera that Aridane, heroically, ended up disrupting while his goalkeeper signed a stretch of uncertain outcome. With these premises, it was not strange that the game went to half-time just as it began: with the score 0-0.

At the restart, the locals redoubled their efforts. And, to tell the truth, it didn't take them long to open the can. Miguel, after a measured pass from David López, assisted Tsygankov so that the Ukrainian sent the ball into the back of the net. The goal, however, did not discourage Rayo, who saw with relief how Míchel's men were unable to kill the game and who were even able to threaten Gazzaniga, albeit timidly.

Until Chavarría, in the most absurd way, practically expelled himself when he saw the second yellow card coming very hard against a rival immediately after having received the first card. Dimitrievski, however, kept his team alive with a good save from Stuani's point-blank shot. He could do nothing, however, to prevent Savinho, almost into added time, from ending up killing the entire match with the score at 2-0, which would soon be accompanied by the score of 3-0.

Prince Rainier sponsored the coolest Txuri-Urdin winger. “Qui est ce petit diable?” exclaimed the sovereign after witnessing his dazzling dribbles in the final of the 1975 Monaco youth tournament, won by Spain over France (2-1). «Some journalist heard that and from then on I kept that nickname. I was skilled, a different player from that Real Sociedad team of the 80s, which had very strong people, like Satrústegui, Idígoras or Górriz. I was different, to give today's young people an idea, I played in a similar way to Iniesta or David Silva. “I was a winger and then I moved to midfield,” explains Roberto López Ufarte (Fez, Morocco, 1958), a left-handed player who captivated with his dribbling.

López Ufarte is an emblem in the history of Real Sociedad, winner of two Leagues (1980-81 and 1981-82) and idol of Spain in the 1982 World Cup.. He opened the scoring in the first Copa del Rey final won by Real Sociedad, on March 30, 1987, against Atlético de Madrid (2-2, extra time and victory on penalties). This Tuesday, the San Sebastian team, against Mallorca, seeks its fifth appearance in a cup final, 0-0 in the first leg.

«I played that final knowing that it was going to be my last game with Real Sociedad. Toshack, who was the coach, had told me that my time had passed, that I had to leave. That day I didn't know that weeks later I was going to sign for Atlético. Jesús Gil y Gil became president of the club, hired Menotti and the Argentine insisted on having me. I was part of Jesús Gil's first project, the one that was headed by Futre. The Portuguese and I played in the same position,” recalls the former footballer.

«We played in Zaragoza, it was hot and there were many mosquitoes that got into our eyes and mouths. We were not favorites. We changed the system, Larrañaga moved to the center of the field. We finished 2-2. I scored the first goal, then Da Silva tied, we went ahead with a goal from Txiki Begiristain and Rubio tied. We went to extra time and won on penalties, with two saves from Arconada. I think that day the motto 'It's okay, we have Arconada' was born. We celebrated the victory at the hotel and then we went to San Sebastián to celebrate with the people and the institutions. I have a strange memory, of joy and sadness, because we won, but I knew that I was going to leave a team that was my life.. “Some insisted that I stay when they had previously told me to leave,” the former royalist striker said in a telephone conversation.

The path to that final bears certain parallels with today. In the semifinals, Real faced Athletic, precisely Atlético de Madrid's rival in next Thursday's tie. «I remember that in the first leg, in our field, we had a very bad time because for a long time we played with two less, it seemed that Athletic spared our lives. We resisted as best we could. In the second leg we won 0-1 with a goal from José Mari Bakero,” emphasizes The Little Devil, who adds that that match was complicated, as could be this Tuesday's.

«When the ball came out of the draw matchup, many were happy because, a priori, Mallorca is weaker than Atlético or Athletic, but I didn't really like it.. And historically, Mallorca has never been good at Real Sociedad. We've always had problems, and now it won't be any different. The first leg ended 0-0 but nothing has been decided. In addition, Mallorca has a coach, Javier Aguirre, who knows the job very well.. The tie is very open, the same goes for San Mamés, I see Atlético capable of getting into the final. Who do I prefer in the final? Maybe to Atlético because I was part of that club,” he warns.

The fact is that Real has a new opportunity to get a ticket to the final with a team that also aspires to get into the Champions League quarterfinals.. Now it is a good squad, but different from the one that amazed 40 years ago. «The secret of that is that we were like a family, we knew each other since we were little, we played on the beach, in La Concha. We combined very well. On the playing field I always had a special understanding with Zamora. In the field we understood each other with our eyes closed. I also related well with the young people who were arriving, like Bakero or Begristiain. One crucial thing is that as soon as we were injured, the same team was almost always repeated. We spent practically the entire season with 13 players. “People knew the team by heart,” he recalls.. The base team of the 80s, coached by Alberto Ormaetxea, was the following: Arconada; Celayeta, Górriz, Gajate, Olaziola; Diego, Alonso, Zamora; Idígoras, Satrústegui and López Ufarte.

A group of youth players that stood up to Real Madrid in the League, that snatched the champion title from them on the last day and that for several years was the backbone of the Spanish team.

The winger says that before there was more connection between the players: “Then football was different, it was more enjoyable.”. We spent a lot of time together, after games or training we would stay to eat or have tapas.. We were a strong family. Gorriz and Gajate joked that their respective wives told them that they spent more time together than with them. We still usually meet up, at least once a year, during the Christmas weeks.. Now everything is different in human treatment and, above all, about money, let's not even talk about it.. “Before, with what you earned in one year you paid for a house in three years, now with what you earn in one season you buy three houses.”

López Ufarte was a small, skinny kid who looked out of place among physically powerful players.. But he knew how to take advantage of his virtues. «There was a coach, Javier Expósito, who asked us who was the bravest player on the team. Many said that Satrústegui and Idígoras, but he responded that I was the bravest, because I went to dribble, they kicked me, but I did it again without fear.

His exquisite technique was a consequence of the famine during his childhood: «After the Civil War, my parents went to Morocco to look for work.. I was born in Fez. I remember that when I was a child I played in a very small playground, with 20 or 30 children, the spaces were small and I think my dribbling ability was born there, the same old street football.. Qualities that allowed him to score 129 goals for Real Sociedad and be the club's second top scorer, only surpassed by Satrústegui.. With the Spanish team he played 15 games and scored seven goals.

After leaving Real Sociedad he played a season at Atlético de Madrid and in 1988 he signed for Betis. He retired in 1989, but has always been related to football and, especially, to the San Sebastian club.. «At Real I spent 12 years as a player and 12 as a coach, helping coaches like Toshack, Irureta, Clemente and Krauss. I have spent a quarter of my life with Real. I was like the Molowny of the Royal Society, a man of the house. As a coach I have been with Toshack on several occasions, I believe that since he was the one who decided that I should not continue at Real, out of remorse whenever he could he turned to me as second coach,” he underlines.

In 2013 he went to Vanuatu (Australia) and a year later to Morocco, in the Casablanca team. At 65 years old, The Little Devil collaborates with Cadena Cope. Tonight he will comment on the game with the memory of that unforgettable first time.