Esther Sullastres

Esther Sullastres Ayuso (Spanish pronunciation: [esˈteɾ suˈʎastɾes aˈʝuso]; born 20 March 1993) is a Spanish football goalkeeper who currently plays for Deportivo La Coruña in the Primera División.

Esther Sullastres
Esther Sullastres at the UEFA Women's Under-19 Championship Finals
Personal information
Full name Esther Sullastres Ayuso
Date of birth (1993-03-20) 20 March 1993
Place of birth Torroella de Montgrí, Girona, Spain
Height 1.74 m (5 ft 8 1⁄2 in)
Position(s) Goalkeeper
Club information
Current team
 Deportivo La Coruña
Number 1
Youth career
2001–2008 L'Estartit
Senior career*
Years Team Apps (Gls)
2001–2012 L'Estartit 200 (24)
2012–2013 Barcelona 10 (0)
2013–2015 Transportes Alcaine 46 (0)
2015–2017 Valencia 42 (0)
2017–2019 Zaragoza CFF 11 (?)
2019– Deportivo La Coruña
National team
2010 Spain U17 3 (0)
2011–2012 Spain U19 11 (0)
2016–2017 Catalonia 2 (0)
2017– Spain 1 (0)
* Senior club appearances and goals counted for the domestic league only

Before joining FC Barcelona in the 2012–13 season, Sullastres played for UE L'Estartit. Currently, she has a contract with Barcelona until 2013. She has been on the Under-17 and Under-19 Spanish national youth teams.[1]

Early career with UE L'Estartit

Sullastres was born in Torroella de Montgrí, Girona, Catalonia, and she started her career with UE L'Estartit's youth team in July 2001. She played on youth teams that won several tournaments, and a league championship in the 2007–08 season, with only 7 goals scored against.

Sullastres joined the senior team at a young age, and with her good performances, became a first-string player.[2]

By the end of the Superliga that, Estartit had obtained great results (they ended up in first place in the "second" minileague) and qualified for the Copa de la Reina, though they were disqualified in the first leg, against UD Levante.

L'Estartit wanted to stand out in a competitive league.[3] However, under the economic stress of traveling expenses and facing veteran teams with greater financial resources,[4] L'Estartit was relegated to the second division after five years in Primera División.

Barcelona

Sullastres first joined FC Barcelona's women's team in July 2012. The team gave her an opportunity after the relegation with Estartit.

She participated in half of the games Barcelona played. Her first appearance took place in Manresa against her former team Estartit. FC Barcelona beat Copa Catalunya in the semifinals, with a result of 8–0, and a few days later won the Queen's Cup after defeating RCD Espanyol in the finals.

At the beginning of the 2012–13 season, their start was poor, as they lost the first two games, then to Espanyol and, later, to Rayo Vallecano de Madrid, but went on to win every other game and to again win the championship, in the last game against Athletic Club.

2012 Women's Champions League

FC Barcelona's league title in the 2011–12 season, permitted the girls to play in this championship league in the following months. After drawing lots they knew their rival was Arsenal Ladies FC. The first leg took place in Mini Estadi, in Barcelona. Sullastres was the first-string goalkeeper, but, unfortunately, the match was a 0–3 loss.

In the second leg, in London, the Arsenal ladies won again, 4–0. Sullastres did not play this time. Here ended the Champions League dream of these girls, which they hope one day to have again.

2010 Women's Under-17 Championship and Under-19 play

Sullastres participated in the second qualifying round of the Women's Under-17 European Championship, which took place in Las Rozas de Madrid, in 2010, where she first appeared as an international player, in the third match of the championship, playing eleven minutes against Switzerland, in a match whose result was a draw (0–0). With that result, the team scored seven points, out of nine possible, and ended up qualifying for the final round to be played in Nyon, Switzerland. Sullastres, though, did not play. The team won the European Cup.

For the next two years Sullastres was a part of the Under-19 team, and, finally, in the 2011–2012 season, she was chosen to participate in the three phases of the European Championship.

2012 Women's European Championship

Sullastres was chosen to play in the first phase. The first round was played in Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, in September, 2011. It consisted of three matches: The first one against the host team, Bosnia and Herzegovina,[5] with a positive result (9–0); the second one was against Moldova,[6] with another victory (8–0); and the last one, against Switzerland[7] (currently classified in the Women's Under-20 World's cup) also a victory of 3–0. Sullastres played the full game against Moldova, allowing zero goals.

The games were played in Grbavica and SRC Slavija stadiums, and they were refereed by Florence Guillemin (FRA) and Giovanna Farinelli (ITA), respectively. With 9 points, 0 allowed goals and 20 scored goals, the Spanish girls were a part of the best team of the first qualifying round.

Qualifying for the second round in Sochi, Russia, the team trained hard until then. The matches were, in order: Spain – Italy,[8] with a victory of 4–0, played in Sputnik-Sport stadium and refereed by Riem Hussein (GER); Spain – Russia,[9] another 4–0 victory for Spain, refereed by Betina Norman (DEN); and the last one, against Scotland[10] with a result of 2–3 for Spain, this time played in Centralni Stadium. Russia's weather caused some problems in that month of April, 2012. Some matches were suspended because of the hard and cold rain. Sullastres played only 17 minutes of the Russian match. Although this time the Spanish team allowed two goals, they continued to be the best team of the championship. Knowing that powers like Germany, Italy, France, and Norway were not in the final round in Antalya, Turkey, Vilda's players held onto their hopes for defending the cup for one more year.

The final round resulted in the girls getting the silver medal. A good 3–0 starting against Serbia[11] in World of Wonders Football Centre stadium, and an amazing 4–0 against England[12] in Titanic stadium, respectively refereed by Zuzana Kováčová (SVK) and Stéphanie Frappart (FRA), let the team get into the semifinals. Sullastres played 4 minutes against England. They seemed to play their third match against Sweden[13] as an obligatory draw (0–0). This game was played in Mardan Sport Complex stadium (Field 2). The referee was the Armenian Knarik Grigoryan.

After much struggling in the semifinal against Portugal (Mardan Sport Complex stadium (Field 1), Referee: Riem Hussein (GER)),[14] Spain won (1–0), which put the girls got into the final for the third consecutively time.

Unfortunately, things did not go well the night of the final. Goals did not want to come, and the match ended up a 0–0 draw at the end of regular play. Spain lost in overtime (0–1) in the 108th minute.[15] It is said that Spanish players protested to the French referee, Stéphanie Frappart, for not having validated a goal.[16]

However, with the silver medal, Sullastres was at a high-level in her sport, a good ending to the last year of her youth career.

Honours
Barcelona
Spain

References
  1. Profile in UEFA's website
  2. Esther Sullastres, a player of Estartit Archived 2012-06-26 at the Wayback Machine Futbol Girona Archived 2012-02-13 at the Wayback Machine's website
  3. Menayo, David (2 September 2011). "Un L'Estartit motivado apuesta por hacerse notar" [A motivated L'Estartit wants to stand out]. Diario Marca (in Spanish). Retrieved 30 March 2015.
  4. Artigas, Marti (9 February 2015). "Esther Sullastres: "Estem preparades per qualsevol partit"" [We are ready for facing any match]. Esport Femení (in Catalan). Archived from the original on 3 April 2015. Retrieved 30 March 2015.
  16. "Sweden keep cool to end wait in Antalya heat". UEFA. Retrieved 30 March 2015.

YouTube videos showing Sullastres' play as a member of L'Estartit

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