Jenni Hermoso could already feel the butterflies. There were plenty of tears shed after the win against the Netherlands, and if they can beat Sweden on Tuesday to reach Spain’s first World Cup final then doubtless there will be plenty more. But now, as she put it: “We need to feel that nervous sensation in our stomach. Just thinking about it gives me shivers. It feels so close.”
As she stepped into the press conference room at Auckland’s Eden Park, the first thing she noticed was the sheer number of journalists and cameras in the room. The semi-final between Spain and Sweden is a 46,000 sell-out, but of course Hermoso can remember the days when, as she put it, “there were five or 10 people asking us questions and 300 people watching the game”. She can sense the magnitude of what they might achieve. But she can also feel the weight of what they already have.
After Spain beat the Netherlands on Friday, the cameras zoomed in on Hermoso on the bench, her arms wrapped around teammate Alexia Putellas, both of them weeping. “I kept crying until I reached the hotel,” she said. “We’ve been through so much together, so many players have fought for this. This match is the result of thousands upon thousands of training sessions, moments when we were away from our family, lots of sacrifices.”
And it has been that kind of tournament for Spain, a swirl of vivid and often conflicting emotions over what this all means. It is almost a year since the open revolt that led to 15 players demanding the removal of the coach Jorge Vilda and make numerous complaints about the team’s culture and support system. Some returned to the fold with varying degrees of reluctance; some have stayed away. Throw in the 4-0 defeat against Japan and the turbulent extra-time victory against the Netherlands and this has been quite a ride. Everyone wants the same thing. Nobody is quite sure how to feel about it.
Vilda said the team had been working with a psychologist in order to help them process their emotions. “He [the psychologist] tells us that it’s good to cry, which is why Jenni and I didn’t stop the other day,” Vilda said. “I was very emotional, not only for Jenni but for the situation of the other players who have been through this.”
And little by little, the Spanish public are beginning to follow them on their journey. The last-16 game with Switzerland attracted a 37.1% audience on the public broadcaster La1 and, although they are partly shut off by their remoteness, Vilda senses a shift. “We’re not living it in the first person, but we’re receiving a lot of messages from all over Spain, from the royal family, clubs, institutions,” he said. “This has multiplied by a factor of three or four from the previous World Cup in France.
“If we have a great success, there is the example of other teams like England or Holland, who reached the final stage and there was an explosion in women’s football. In Spain we’re still living through it. We haven’t achieved everything so far. But this is the last step to where we want to be.”
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The challenge of Sweden, the highest-ranked team remaining in the tournament, should not be underestimated. Already they have seen off the contrasting challenges of the US and Japan, offer a menacing threat at set pieces and have the experience and knowledge to know how these games are won. They, too, have a stirring motivation: finally winning a first international trophy since 1984 after six losing finals and eight losing semi-finals. “We’ve come close,” the Barcelona winger Fridolina Rolfö said. “Now we want to win this title for the Swedish people.”
Either way, something has to give here: the tournament’s most prolific attack against its most resilient defence, stylish possession play against dogged tournament football, two teams trying to craft a perfect future out of an imperfect past. “Bloody hell, we’re in the semi-finals,” Hermoso marvelled at one point. “Whatever happens, we will continue. This is not going to end here.”
