For a little while it looked as if the impossible might happen. It was half-time in the Champions League quarter-final at Valdebebas and Barcelona were losing. Not just the first leg, but for the first time: defeat would be their first against Real Madrid, the team built to be their rivals, and the first against anyone all season. It was March and they had not even drawn yet – played 34, won 34 – but Olga Carmona’s early goal had them trailing.
Struggling, too. This wasn’t the way it was supposed to be, Madrid more dynamic and deserving of the lead. “We weren’t happy,” Fridolina Rolfö says, “so we changed things.” Forty-five minutes later, two from Alexia Putellas and one from Clàudia Pina completed a comeback. Barcelona had won but that wasn’t the news; the news was that they nearly hadn’t. “It was good for us to get that game,” Rolfö says. “Hopefully we learned a lesson.”
