Tactics Talk with Verónica Boquete

The former Spain international has enjoyed a glittering career and is still going strong in Serie A with Fiorentina, and is the latest to take a look back over her career...

Feb 10, 2025

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Verónica Boquete is one of the finest players to have graced the European game. If her 38 goals in 62 caps for the Spanish national team doesn’t help consolidate that, perhaps her multiple titles in multiple top leagues, her Champions League title, or her multitude of personal honours stretching her 20-year senior career does.

While her international career is long done - Boquete still stands as the second top female scorer in her country’s history - she is very much not, still going strong at 37 for Fiorentina in Italy, the latest big club she has represented, following on from the likes of Portland Thorns, PSG, Tyresö, Bayern Munich, AC Milan and several others.

Her ability to both score and create with ease has set the Spaniard apart over two decades playing at the top level, and Boquete is the latest to sit down for a Tactics Talk feature to look over her own development and adaption as the women’s game has grown exponentially, as well as analysing her toughest opponents, which leagues challenged her the most, and her multiple European finals…

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“Firstly, I will say I look at myself as an offensive midfielder,” says Boquete, when I ask her to summarise her role, given she has played in multiple attacking positions over the years.

“For different reasons, I have adapted my game and I think for the better because I think you are a more complete player when you understand different roles. When I started playing, I was actually a centre-back and from there I moved higher and higher and eventually became a number nine, then a midfielder, then finally a number 10.

“I think all that gives you more understanding of the game, of those around you playing positions you once played. In the last 10 to 15 years the game has grown a lot too, in the physical way, the tactical way, it’s so much tactical and technical and I think if you understand the game, you can understand every style, every team, and I think everything I learned when I was younger has helped me a lot.”

Boquete was born in the autonomous region of Galicia and grew up playing football on the streets.

Her father was a coach in the Spanish third division, while her brother also played, and Boquete went onto play futsal where she honed her technical skills before being scouted and picked for the Spain Under 19s squad in 2004.

The same year, she took the first steps into senior football with Zaragoza, only a year later making her debut for the senior Spanish national team in February 2005, the moment her top-level career really kicked off.

What though does it mean to play for Spain when it comes to style?

Surprisingly, Boquete admits it hasn’t always been the stereotypical ‘tiki taka’ football people now come to associate with the new world champions.

“It’s part of our DNA now,” she admits. “Every Spanish player knows our style is to have the ball, to be technically the best, to play quickly, but it wasn’t always like that.

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