The female Atlético de Madrid player, Virginia Torrecillahas received the “The Guardian” award 2022 for the best footballer of the year. An award that the English publication gives “to a player who has done something remarkablewhether it is overcoming adversity, helping others or giving a sports example acting with honesty exceptional”.
The history of Virginia is already known to all, in 2020 they detected a tumor cerebral for what it had to be emergency intervention and had to undergo a chemo treatment in order to overcome the disease. When he was in full recovery, he suffered a traffic accident when she was with her mother, Mari, in the car, in which the soccer player escaped unharmed, but her mother ended up in wheelchair and with irreparable damage.
“I was sunk. She would go through cancer 15 more times. 15, huh. She would do 30 chemotherapies for my mom to walk again. I promise, I promise. With all my heart. Three years on chemotherapy. Five! I don’t care, if only he could get back on his feet. I blamed myself. She says I can’t think like that. She is my mom, she will always defend me. But, no, no. What my mom went through…”, he points out through tears.
Virginia thought of leaving everything
When they detected the disease, they told him that I couldn’t play football again but two years later he has been able return to the playing fields in a very special match against the women’s Barça where she was blanketed by her fellow professionals. “I got up, left with my mask and coat. I ran back to the bench, left it there, the mask and the coat. No shin guards. It was a mess. I was super nervous. She hadn’t played in two years and she could barely remember what to do. She was so desperate to get out, for people to see me. I wanted people to see that I had overcome cancer and that they too could”, recalls the player
The player confessed that when she had suffered the most it was with the whole issue of her mother, “When people say I’m a fighter, an example, it’s lovely”dice, “But the pain I felt: it’s not the cancer in my body, it’s everything I overcame psychologically, everything I went through with my mom. That’s hard, honestly. Very, very, very hard”.
Virginia has made a special mention of her club, Atlético de Madrid, who were by her side at all times and showed their support.”I had the support of Atlético: otherwise I wouldn’t be here. People could not enter the hospitals. My uncle died after five months because he couldn’t get treatment. He passed away with prostate cancer. no funeral”, reported Virginia.
Her wish for 2023 is to be able to compete again at the level she did before her illness and to have her loved ones close to her to see her achieve her successes: “I dream of seeing my mom here, my dad next to her, watching me play soccer after everything we’ve been through.. And now we’re on the road.”