Propelled by the former Barcelona star, Mariona Caldentey, Arsenal must upset the chances of the Catalan giants of all the conquerors on Saturday to prevent them from winning a fourth title of the female Champions League in five years. Reaching their sixth final in seven years, Barcelona aims to tighten their grip more on the female match at the Jose Alvalade stadium in Lisbon against Renee Slegers. The Dutch coach replaced Jonas Eidevall in October temporarily, made permanent in January while the team form improved considerably under him.
In the Champions League, Arsenal produced a return to the quarterfinals in the quarter-final to eliminate Real Madrid, then beat the record winner Eight times Lyon 4-1 in France to reach the final.
While Lyon is the record holders, Barcelona has been the dominant strength of Europe in the past five years.
The Catalans have placed themselves in their fifth consecutive final by destroying the winners of triple English servants Chelsea 8-2 on the aggregates.
Barcelona, which won the Champions League in 2021, 2023 and 2024, also sealed a sixth Liga F victory and is well placed to repeat the quadruple last season.
They have twice the winners of the Ballon d’Or, Aitana Bonmati and Alexia Potellas, as well as a range of other stars, although they also lost important players.
One of them is the winger Mariona Caldentey, a regular in Barcelona in the last decade who has gone to seek a new adventure.
The 29 -year -old joined Arsenal in July and became the key player of the team, appointed player of the female season of the season.
“She gave us this next level,” said Slegers. “He’s a total footballer. She has everything.”
Barça winger Caroline Graham Hansen said he would be strange in front of Spanish.
“Obviously, she was missed because she is a very nice person in the locker room and a fantastic player on the ground,” said the Norwegian.
“So it’s going to be weird to see her on the other side …
“(I hope) I won’t see any goal from her on Saturday.”
Of course, Caldentey has other plans.
“I hope I can score, but I would not celebrate,” she told Mundo Deportivo.
“I have a lot of respect for Barça for everything they gave me, how they helped me, and I will always show this respect.”
While Barcelona has three trophies from the Champions League in four years, Arsenal won the competition only once, at the time when it was the UEFA Women’s Cup in 2007.
This is their first Champions League final since then.
– Back at the start –
The final is the 100th European match in Barcelona, 13 years after their first, also against Arsenal.
At the time, the Gunners were a much greater force than their opponents and completed a global victory of 7-0 against Barcelona during the Champions League of 32.
Kim Little has scored in this equality and should appear for Arsenal in the final, as well as the only other survivor of that time – the Palellas of Barça.
This season, it took a little time in Barcelona to find his best under the coach Pere Romeu, after the departure of Jonatan Giraldez at the end of last season for us, Washington Spirit.
The Catalans also had to adapt to a new striker, Ewa Pajor, Poland, who scored 43 impressive goals in 45 games this season.
“It’s my dream of winning this trophy with this team, but we have to be calm, not obsessed with this trophy,” Pajor told UEFA.
“We must be prepared, to be concentrated and I hope that we will win this trophy as a team, because we have incredible and incredible players, incredible coaches and, yes, we can do it.”
Barcelona won her last nine games in the Champions League, scoring 44 goals in the process, a shy from the Wolfsburg 45 record of the 2013-14 season.
Claudia Pina intensified to fill the gap left by Caldentey and scored 10, which makes him the best scorer in the competition, before Alessia Russo and Caldeney d’Arsenal out of seven.
RBS / PI
(With the exception of the title, this story has not been published by NDTV staff and is published from a unionized flow.)
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