2024-01-06 10:00:31
Barcelona”I’m very happy to make my debut with the first team. It’s a dream I’ve fulfilled,” said Martina Fernández (Ordis, Girona, 2004), defender of the Barça subsidiary, when she made her debut in the First Division in Valencia, in February 2022, becoming the sixth youngest to do so, aged just 17 years, 4 months and one day. She has now accumulated five titles with the Blaugrana first team and is called upon to repeat many more times in the starting eleven. Injuries to Mapi León, Irene Paredes and Jana Fernández have paved the way for him.
Two years after that debut, he is a key piece for Jonatan Giráldez in the central pair and this Saturday he will play in the Catalan derby against Llevant les Plaines (6.30 p.m., DAZN). Before, however, he had to spend many hours in a car traveling across Catalonia to be able to play football. The sacrifice of her parents has led her to be a constant soccer player with a desire to learn. She has not stopped growing since Barça captured her in 2018.
“The first season she lived at home and on the days she had to train we shared the journeys with two of her team mates”, explains Martina’s family environment, which has taken care of the ARA. Ordis, his native town, was far from Barcelona. More than 150 kilometers separated their origins from their future. Despite the unseasonable training schedules, the effort of the parents was great. “We left home at five in the afternoon and arrived past twelve at night,” they remember.
This fact led to significant exhaustion for the family. They were very long distances that crossed half of the Catalan territory in more than an hour and a half in a car. The future was uncertain, but the ambition to achieve the dream of being a Barça player was abysmal. “There was a lot of wear and tear at all levels, but given the situation and the accompanying results, everything was minimized,” they remember.
Up and down Barcelona ended his second year at Barça. The girl’s family requested that she reside and study at an institute in the capital. That was the case at first, but in the middle of the year the pandemic forced Martina to return to Ordis. Later he settled there again. This time, however, with her older sister and other teammates.
In the summer of 2021, at the beginning of their fourth season, Barça informed the family that they were creating a Masia for girls. One of the nine pioneers was Martina, who combined sports with studies while living at the Oriol Tort Training Center. “They told us that one of the few places there was for her. Although in other circumstances she would have stayed at home for three more years, it was worth this emancipation to fulfill her desire to be a professional footballer” , comment from the family.
Between Agassi and a good restaurant
He has a very intimate and special relationship with his maternal grandparents because they have practically lived together. He’s very family-oriented, always calls parents after games and even dedicates goals with a heart for mom. She is also a girl who, when she was able to go up to her village, was reunited with her childhood friends. “She’s very funny, nice, nice and crazy,” they point out. He is a person who knows how to disconnect from football, but without stopping to think about what will be better to have a good performance the next day.
In his spare time he likes to be with his people and read books about the lives of great athletes, such as Andre Agassi and Manel Estiarte. “She also really likes good food. Going to dinner at a good restaurant is a great plan for her,” the family point out. Clothes are one of her other weak points, as are shoes: “If it were up to her, I’d only buy thighs.” He also listens to Nil Moliner, the Catalan singer who has caused a stir in the women’s locker room. But Martina has a very varied taste in music. “One day he’ll be listening to Lil Tjay and Luh Kel and the next La Oreja de Van Gogh.”
Biomedicine, his other passion
“She is lucky that, without being able to devote all the time she should, she has enough capacity to carry out her studies with good results,” the family proudly explains. He has always wanted to study a career related to the scientific branch. The mandatory practices, however, in his case pose a difficulty due to the lack of attendance due to obligations with the club and the Spanish national team.
That is why last year, after seeing the obstacles he could not avoid, he had to abandon the biomedical career. However, he found his place in a higher biomedical laboratory cycle that offered him semi-attendance. Martina has been able to continue combining football with her studies.
Out of mother’s insistence
“She played tennis, and one day her mother came to Borrassà because she wanted to play football,” Pau Quirante, Martina’s first coach, told ARA. The coach’s first answer did not please the mother very much: the team was complete and there was no place for Martina.
The insistence, however, meant that Martina was able to train with the boys’ team to test whether she liked it or not, although they did not guarantee her a sports card. “On the third day of training I said to her mother: “We’ll sign this girl as soon as we can”. She was a girl out of the ordinary”, admits Quirante with a smile from ear to ear and proud to see – the triumph
He stayed there for three years, until he signed for Girona in the first year of junior high school – between the ages of 13 and 14. But the category was too small for him. “We decided, even though she wasn’t that old, to put her with the youth cadet. She was playing with 19-year-old girls,” explains Boris Nadal, the coach who had her at the white-and-red club. Her ambition to improve led her, after two seasons in the Girona capital, to sign for Barça.
The effort of the parents has allowed Martina to be who she is now. Who was to tell her mother that after insisting on signing her up for the football team in the next town, the same girl would, a few years later, score her first goal in the Champions League in a swedish stadium And I would dedicate it to her by making a heart. Blessed mother’s insistence.
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