Spain has become one of the most successful countries in women’s football — both through its national team and at the club level, thanks to four-time Champions League winners FC Barcelona, which carries much of Liga F’s representation on a global stage.
However, the Spanish domestic league has not seen the same sustained success. The league is taking steps forward but many believe they are not moving quickly enough, especially with other European leagues investing in their structures.
When Spain captured its first Women’s World Cup title in 2023, 21 of the 23 players belonged to clubs in Liga F — Ona Batlle (then with Manchester United in England) and Jennifer Hermoso (then with Pachuca in Mexico) were the outliers.
Three years later, only six remain: Cata Coll, Irene Paredes, Aitana Bonmati, Hermoso (who joined Atletico Madrid this year), Athenea del Castillo and Eva Navarro. Of the 2023 group, Claudia Zornoza retired and Tere Abelleira left Real Madrid but has yet to join a new club. The rest are playing in leagues in other countries.
This summer’s player exodus intensified the concern as four key players left Barcelona.
Alexia Putellas, Mapi León, Salma Paralluelo and Batlle left at the end of their contracts, meaning Barcelona didn’t make money from their departures. They join players such as Mariona Caldentey, Laia Codina and Jana Fernández, who also made the move away in recent years.
While not having to pay some of the larger contracts helps Barcelona’s already shaky financial situation, not receiving money in return for many of the players does not help. Barcelona also continues to go through a financial crisis from which it has not yet fully recovered. The stadium refurbishment to Camp Nou and a debt inherited from the previous board — which in 2021 saw Barcelona record the biggest loss for a football club, losing €555.4 million — have meant that the club has had to tighten its belt across all departments in recent years in an attempt to get its finances back on track.
This, combined with the club’s inability to offer lucrative contracts, has reduced the appeal of Barcelona among female players, particularly when compared to clubs owned by the American businesswoman Michele Kang (London City Lionesses and Olympique Lyonnais in Europe). Putellas’ move to London City after more than a decade with Barcelona was especially poignant. The captain of the Spanish national team was also a key figure in the professionalization of women’s football in Spain.
Barcelona has become a microcosm of the larger issue across the Spanish league. When Barcelona struggles, the issues become impossible to ignore.
While other leagues are investing — WSL clubs reported a 39 per cent increase in aggregate revenue in the 2024-25 season, up to £90 million, according to a Deloitte report — Liga F has fallen behind. And the gap between teams has grown deeper, impacting overall competition.
Over the summer, Spanish basketball legend Pau Gasol spearheaded a historic investment of €55 million into Liga F. The aim is for the league to be able to compete with the major European leagues, but it remains to be seen what the results of this investment will be — or how fast it can turn things around.
“The players don’t want to leave, but it seems they are being unconsciously pushed to do so to avoid being left behind,” says a source who wished to remain anonymous due to ongoing matters within the league.
Barcelona players have left for various reasons, but the overwhelming sentiment is that they feel the league hasn’t given enough attention and care to improving the competition.
FC Barcelona has won the league title every year since 2020. The big question is whether the Catalan club will win with a perfect record, or which goalscoring record they will break that year, not who will take their crown. Barcelona have won six of their seven games to start the 2026-27 campaign, losing only to Sociedad 2-1 last weekend. They are only two points ahead of the next closest team, Real Madrid, in the table, but have more than double the points of eight of the 16 teams already.
“If I’d started looking at Liga F without taking Barça into account, I wouldn’t have stayed here. That’s how clearly I’ll put it,” Aitana Bonmati told The Athletic in an interview following her latest contract renewal with FC Barcelona in September 2024. “It’s sad to see how other leagues are overtaking us at an incredible pace when we have the potential to be a top league.”
Bonmati’s assessment of the league and Spain as a whole following their 2023 World Cup win was dire.
“If, with these strengths, we don’t have a sufficiently important league, it’s something to look at. We are stagnating. It’s not getting any better. We don’t even have a (main) sponsor in the league. What interest is being shown in this league? Who is running this league? Perhaps we should be more humble, follow the example of the English league (WSL) and see how they do things,” she said. “The same goes for the national team. If the changes don’t come, it’s a sign that the people running this league aren’t interested in moving forward.”
Almost two years have passed since that interview, and Bonmati’s words have become a fulfilled premonition.
England capitalised on the momentum from their home victory at Euro 2022 by providing their teams with better facilities and conditions. Manchester City opened a £10 million women’s headquarters earlier this year. It hasn’t gone unnoticed. Spain has yet to do the same outside of Barcelona’s strong, previously established youth setup at La Masia.
The league only turned fully professional in 2022, four years after its English counterparts and nearly a decade after the NWSL in the United States. Today it remains a competition that still sees one of the world’s biggest clubs competing alongside clubs that are struggling financially to cope with professionalization.
The players who have left are sharing what they find abroad — be it England, the U.S. or France — with their national team teammates.
“They think the players don’t talk to each other,” a source close to the FC Barcelona dressing room, who wishes to remain anonymous to protect their job, told The Athletic.
Sharing their experiences and seeing the differences between competitions has been a decisive factor in bringing about the recent exodus.
It is not only Barcelona that have lost players. At Real Madrid, goalscorer Caroline Weir signed with OL Lyonnes, Naomie Feller moved to Paris Saint-Germain, Alba Redondo is now with Juventus and Misa Rodriguez plays for Arsenal.
Players have suggested changes to the league’s format as a start to remedying the current crisis, including a reduction in the number of teams. They believe that a shorter league season would mean they wouldn’t be as exhausted — Spanish players have clocked some of the most minutes in recent years because they have gone far in both club and national team competitions.
“The Spanish league should have fewer clubs because the fixture list we have and the number of matches we play is not healthy for the players. The facilities at the grounds where we play and the visibility we are given should be improved,” Caldentey said at a press conference in 2024.
Caldentey was one of the first major players in recent seasons to switch from Liga F to the WSL when she did so in 2024. In her first season at Arsenal, she was named the competition’s best player.
“We have to fight to make it a more competitive league and that means fewer teams. We have to look at the exemplary leagues in Europe and see how many matches they play,” Bonmati said in an interview with The Athletic in 2024 amid a crowded summer with the Paris Olympics. “Who cares about our performance so that we can shine in every game?”
Under the current conditions, Spain has produced world champions and Champions League winners for several seasons running. How much further could the league go with more investment?
This article originally appeared in The Athletic.
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