“Carolina”, “Carolina”, could be heard in the Saarlandhalle, the multipurpose pavilion of the German city of Saarbrücken, where Carolina Marín was crowned the best player on the continent for the eighth time. She is her seventh European, to which she adds gold at the 2023 European Games. She has been the undisputed queen of the old continent for a long time now. The first time she won it was in 2014, when she was 20 years old, and now at 30 she is still an impossible player for her rivals.. He has conquered them all consecutively. The Scottish Kirsty Gilmour was never close to victory (21-11 and 21-18). Ten years of incontestable dominance.
The only European in the top 20
Carolina has won seven of the 30 editions that have been held in the history of the European Championship, almost 24 percent. If you look at the world ranking, The Spanish player is number five in the world and to see another European you have to go to the 22nd, to the Danish Mia Blichfeldt. Gilmour, her rival in the final, is number 26. Marín has managed to make what is very difficult look routine or easy. She competes in another league, which includes Asian players, with whom she fights for the most important titles worldwide, with which he will fight to seek glory at the Paris Olympic Games.
Trust
Is he third consecutive victory for the Huelva native in 2024after the prestigious All England (where it surpassed the two, three and four in the world) and the Swiss Open. This latest victory confirms the good moment of the Huelva native and that little by little she has been expelling her inner ghosts.
The two serious injuries to his knees, one in each one, made him lose confidence, especially the second, which had a slow recovery, and he has had to do physical and mental work to return to his level. He played in the final of the last World Cup, but lost it clearly. The next step was to win titles again, and he is already doing it.
Gilmour tried to play aggressively and looking for the Spaniard's body, but in the exchanges the Scotswoman was dominated and ended up being surpassed or throwing the midfielder out of one of her defenses. The first set didn't have much of a story. It was playing through the speakers “sweet Caroline” while Fernando Rivas gave instructions to Marín.
It was not yet time to go into sweet mode, as the song says, the competition mode was still there, because the second set was closer, with a threatening 17-18 from Gilmour. But he went all out on the Carolina attack to not let his rival score another point. Closes the European Championship without giving up a set. When he finished the job, he threw the racket on the ground and went to greet his opponent. He already showed a smile. He could now go into “sweet” mode.
The road to the Paris Games
They remain three and a half months until the start of the Games and Marín's victories, apart from reinforcing her, make her rivals feel that the great Carolina is here again. The Spanish woman has hard work left in the Madrid CAR, at the altitude of the Sierra Nevada CAR and the trip to Paris a couple of weeks before. Maybe she competes before to try to climb one place in the ranking and place four and be seeded in the Olympic tournament.