BarcelonaThere is life beyond Barça. This is what Ari Mingueza (Santa Perpètua de Mogoda, 2003) has learned after three years in Granada. The Catalan midfielder followed in the footsteps of her brother, Óscar Mingueza – who had changed Barcelona for Vigo – and tried a new adventure in the Primera División. “I left because I saw a very big cap in the first team and I felt that I had to leave Barça. Maybe if I had stayed I would have had the opportunity here, because the last two years have had to pull a lot from the squad, but I think everything happens for a reason and now I am very well”, explains the player to ARA. A decision, however, in which Oscar played an important role. “I was afraid because I had never left home, I had been here all my life and it was very difficult for me to make the move. I spoke to him and he told me that life at Barça does not end and that opening doors now could open more doors for me in the future”, he recalls.
Mingueza is now enjoying a Granada that arrives at the best moment of the season. “It is not easy to leave home, but I felt that I had to take the step, and here in Granada they opened their arms to me from the first moment. I left as a child and now I am a woman”, she says. After a complicated start to the season, Irene Ferreras’ team has chained together five wins and a draw and has not lost in the League this 2026. “The first part of the season was not easy, we couldn’t find a way to feel comfortable, but by working every week and training to the max, the results have arrived”. This Saturday, however, they face Barça at the Nuevo Los Cármenes stadium (6.15 p.m.). “Playing against them is always very complicated, and we know that they are the best team in the world, but in a good dynamic you always go out to compete better, because you are in a state where, unconsciously, things come to you,” explains the Catalan.
In Granada she met a coach who helped her grow a lot, Arturo Ruiz. “Last year with him I took a very important step in Primera”, he says. The footballer also highlights the figure of Miguel Llorente, with whom she played at Barça B. “He was my coach in the subsidiary when I made my debut with the first team. I also have a lot of respect for Lluís Cortés, who gave me the opportunity and counted on me a lot”, she reviews.
The journeys to La Masia
Ari Mingueza arrived at the Blaugrana club in 2015 in the children-youth category and went on to become the captain of the Blaugrana subsidiary, champion of the Second Division. “Barça has the best squad in the world and it’s very important to watch at home, there are very good players. I was the captain when Aïcha Camara and Clara Serrajordi started to rise, and I couldn’t be happier that they are in the first team”, he says. The ex-Blaugrana also confesses that, despite the fact that she was “very small”, she learned a lot in her first years at the club. “I compare my fourth season with the first, and you can see an incredible change, they teach you many concepts and I have friends for life who are from the first years at Barça”, he explains.
However, it’s not all flowers and violets. When there was training, his parents had to take him to Barcelona, while his brother did go there with the taxis provided by the club. “The parents of our classmates who were more or less from the area took turns to take us. The first years we finished at eleven at night and it was crazy, but you can tell that steps are being taken and these things are starting to change.” Mingueza refers to the fact that young footballers can now live in La Masia. In her case, she was only able to study high school there, a “great facility” for her.
The two brothers were able to fulfill a dream: to play together at Barça. Oscar made his debut with the men’s first team on November 24, 2020 in Kyiv. 102 days later, on March 6, 2021, he did the same with the women’s Ari Mingueza. In his case, in Badajoz. “For us and for the family it was special, but subconsciously it was the routine and we didn’t value it at all. We both have a very good relationship and I continue to ask him for advice, although I also take pictures of him when he leaves. He knows that he has always been a mirror to look at me”, recalls an Ari Mingueza who admits that many times she is no longer Óscar’s sister. “When they hear the last name they unconsciously associate it with him, but every time I am recognized more by my name”, he says.
