paradisedrive

"you've made me better, you've made all of us better. thank you! 🙌❤️💙"

as you say in the video, alexia, i don’t know where to start. yesterday you laid your heart bare, and today i’ll do the same. and I think or rather, I know that everything i’m about to say to you now, even though it comes from my heart and speaks for me, won’t be just my own feelings.

as a barça fan, it will be incredibly hard for me not to see you play in this shirt anymore. i can’t imagine barça without you. but i also fully understand your decision. because only you could leave in this way: so complete, so consistent, so worthy of everything you’ve been. a perfect story. this year i’ve seen you very happy, happier than in any of the past few years, and that has made us all happy. i know you’re leaving, as you said, full of love. and you deserve it.

one day i showed you a tattoo i have on my arm. “No hi ha distància”. it’s one of the most important things you’ve ever said and, as is often the case with many of the things you do, at the time you probably weren’t even aware of what it would come to mean. what you meant, after losing to wolfsburg and missing out on the champions league final for the only time in the last eight years, was that there was no longer any gap between you and europe’s top teams. that you were ready to win it. and you did. once, twice, three, four times. but that phrase means so much more.

it was the year i started at SPORT and the year i, a nobody, set out to do whatever i could and give it my all so that women’s football in general, and barça in particular, would get the visibility they deserved. so that one day they could become what they are today.

when i was little, i used to play football at school, and it never crossed my mind that i might one day become a footballer, thank goodness i didn’t have the role models that girls have today because, quite frankly, i wasn’t cut out for the game. but then again, i never imagined i might become a sports journalist and be telling all this. when i started out, it never crossed my mind, not even in the furthest corner of my mind, that one day i’d be reporting on champions league finals, records at camp nou, historic trips to bilbao, oslo or eindhoven. even to turin or lisbon. nor that i'd be able to write such a special book about your story.

and this is where that phrase changes everything too. because “no hi ha distància” wasn’t just about you. it was about us too. about all of us who have grown up alongside you. because you have paved the way for us as well. you have made media editors understand that this matters too. that it deserves space. that it deserves front pages. that it deserves to be told. and you have made us part of it too. so that here, too, there is no distance.

because you haven’t just paved the way for the girls of today. you have also made many women who had never felt part of this world understand, at last, that it was theirs too.

i truly believe, and i hope no one takes offence because i’m speaking for myself, that there has never been a better leader or captain in the history of this club. no one who embodies so perfectly, in every possible way, on the pitch, as a person, and in the community, what barça stands for. the titles, both team and individual, that you’ve won are almost the least important part of everything you’ve achieved. you’ve given your all for this badge. for these colours. for these teammates, those who remain and those who have moved on. for this sport. icons like iniesta, busquets and puyol paid tribute to you at your farewell. how incredible that is.

you have led an incredibly gruelling battle to bring women’s football to where it is today. and not just anyone could have done that. you have shouldered a great deal on your own so that it wouldn’t affect the rest of us. you have worn yourself out in daily struggles so that those coming after you would find the path a little easier. and you have succeeded. you spoke up when you had to, even though you’re not one for cameras or microphones. you kept quiet when you had to. always out of respect. there’s no need to list here all the barriers you’ve broken down. you will always be the first in everything.

you made me cry that day at the mini when you secured your place in the champions league final. you made me cry when you said there was no distance between us. you made me cry with that line, “if we win, we’ll be eternal, but because of how we play,” in gothenburg. you made me cry with your first ballon d’or in paris. a triumph for us all. you made me cry with that first bow at camp nou. so elegant. i don’t think there will ever be a more fitting celebration. the queen bowing to her people. “una di voi”.

you made me cry when you broke down, because that day we all broke down. you made me cry with that “when i recover, i’m going to face beasts, so i have to be a beast” to adrián. you made me cry with the second ballon d’or, because i could see you walking properly again, because those had been difficult months and that recognition was the boost you needed then, and also because it was my first time there.

you made me cry when you made your comeback. you made me cry when you lifted the champions league trophy in eindhoven, this time in front of your own fans, and gave patri that kiss on the forehead. you made me cry with that goal in bilbao, which will always be one of the most special i’ve ever witnessed. you made me cry when the camp Nou wouldn’t stop applauding you for your 500th match and chanting your name, and you were moved. you made me cry in oslo.

and yesterday i cried more than ever, at the camp nou and at the johan. because if barça is where it is today, and let me say this too, and if i am where i am, it is largely thanks to you. you’ve changed our lives. mine and that of so many more people than you’ll probably ever imagine. each in their own way.

she wants to leave at her best, which is what she always said i suppose. she’s exhausted. everything the media and the fans put her through must take its toll, and it makes sense that she wants to enjoy her last years before retirement without the pressure of being barça’s captain and her every move being scrutinized.