Cata Coll, the Mallorcan treasure of Barça who declares his "anti-Madridism" without mincing words

Barcelona"I think I'm a person who really likes pressure," said Cata Coll on the show. In the Car. "It's the better I look and the better I play," the footballer continues in the conversation, saying that this is probably why she plays as a goalkeeper: "It's a position in which you are constantly under a lot of pressure. Many times it depends on you whether they score a goal or not." Born in Pòrtol (Mallorca) on April 23, 2001, Coll is the starting goalkeeper for Barça and the Spanish national team at just 23 years old. Despite her youth, her leadership skills and "the confidence she generates in her teammates," according to a former coach of hers, help to understand why she already has the most precious trophies in her hands, the Champions League and the World Cup.

In fact, it was at the 2023 World Cup when she made the leap to the elite. Former coach Jorge Vilda, who had withdrawn confidence from Sandra Paños, given that she had been one of The 15 The team that had refused to be called up a year earlier, started the World Cup with Misa in goal. In the round of 16, however, the coach made a radical change and gave Coll a starting place, who had almost made it into the team by chance after a difficult year due to a serious injury to her left knee. Vilda knew the Barça player from the lower categories of the Spanish team. Cata would take over the goal until the final, in which Spain would celebrate the title.

With Montse Tomé in charge, she has maintained her position as a starter for Spain. At the last Olympic Games, Coll experienced the bitterest side of the profession. She was deeply saddened by an error in the ball's exit that cost her a goal at the start of the semi-finals against Brazil. She discussed it with her psychologist. "I had never been in a situation where I felt so singled out, I had made a mistake and it was my mistake. The least I could do was ask my teammates for forgiveness," she explained. But Coll, who has been seen dribbling past rival forwards on more than one occasion, would recover and continue to insist. Although she admits that perhaps she should not "take so many risks" at times, she maintains that "it is her way of playing" and she will continue to do so.

Being brave with the ball is precisely what makes her "an ideal goalkeeper for Barça's game," say those in the dressing room to ARA. Before the Games, she had also won the trust of Jonatan Giráldez. She shared the minutes with Sandra Paños, as she does this season with Gemma Font and Ellie Roebuck, but the big games were and are for Cata Coll. "It is often said that there are two types of goalkeepers, the craziest and the most serious, Cata belongs to the first group. She is just like mana, one of the most fun in the dressing room – you only have to see her celebrations of the titles – but at the same time she also knows when to be serious and concentrate.

Coll is not one to hide. Before visiting Eibar on Sunday (12 noon), she played a Nations League match with Spain on Wednesday. She was one of those who came out to show her face after the defeat (1-0) against England. "You know that if she comes out to speak, she will be clear and sincere, but she will speak sensibly," they say from the Sports City.

The beginnings of Cata Coll

Coll started playing when she was six years old at Sant Marçal. She didn't play as a goalkeeper, but as a defender. It was at eleven that she decided to play as a goalkeeper. She played in mixed teams until she was fourteen, when she went to the women's team of Atlètic Marratxí. Then she was already in the same boat as Dudú Aouate, from Mallorca. "I slept every night wearing Aouate's shirt," she explained to The Resistance. "Casillas, Neuer and Cech are very good, but my idol is Aoaute," he reaffirmed.

The former Israeli goalkeeper, who arrived at Mallorca in 2008, was the hero of a very delicate final stretch of the 2013-14 season, when with three great performances he was decisive in avoiding relegation to Segunda B. Coll prefers Mallorca. "When he has a free day, he leaves quickly," they summarise from the dressing room. Recently, on the programme Pim Pam Light IB3 made some statements that quickly spread through the networks: "Madrid makes me very angry. I am more anti-Madrid "I'm a culé," she confessed, amused.

Before landing in Barcelona, ​​she moved from Atlético Marratxí to Collerense – where teammates such as Patri Guijarro and former Barça player Mariona Caldentey have also played – when she was fifteen years old. She stayed for three seasons and Barça signed her as a bet for the future. She was loaned to Sevilla. She played sixteen games in the First Division with the Andalusians, but the coronavirus pandemic interrupted the season.

In July 2020 she would return to Barça, where there had always been confidence in her projection and Coll has responded to that confidence by being the goalkeeper in the last Champions League final in which the Blaugranas were once again the queens of Europe. Celebrations that Coll enjoys surrounded by the core of the young players in the dressing room: Claudia Pina, Vicky López, Jana Fernández, Alba Caño... Present and future of Barça.