Salma Paralluelo: The Spain & Barcelona teen looking to make her mark at the 2023 Women's World Cup

After choosing football over a promising career in athletics, the 19-year-old is now on her way to a first senior major tournament

It was April 2, 2022, when Barcelona welcomed Villarreal to the Estadi Johan Cruyff for one of their final league games of the season. With the Catalans having already won the title while their opponents were battling relegation, it was expected to be a straightforward afternoon for the hosts. But then an 18-year-old by the name of Salma Paralluelo did something remarkable.

The Villarreal forward had her back to goal on the right-hand side of the pitch, about 25 yards out, as Alexia Putellas and Leila Ouahabi came to close her down. Instinctively, Paralluelo executed a Cruyff turn to perfection to spin around and dart between the pair, shifted the ball inside onto her left foot and curled it beautifully around oncoming Barca defender Andreas Pereira, sending it flying above the head of goalkeeper Gemma Font and into the top corner.

The sheer disbelief on the face of Belen Martinez, her Villarreal team-mate, summed it up as the rest of those in yellow swarmed her. It was only Paralluelo's fourth appearance in the top tier for the club and she'd just scored one of the goals of the season — a Puskas Award nominee — to put them 1-0 up away at Barcelona after just 12 minutes.

Sadly for Villarreal, Barca would show their quality and complete an emphatic turnaround in the second half, but it was a big moment for Paralluelo who, after showing plenty of potential with Spain's youth national teams over the years, announced herself on the senior stage as a serious prospect in this moment.

Things quickly accelerated from there. In June, despite having never been called up for the senior national team,