Sofia Jakobsson’s departure from Real Madrid is old news now, but it’ll be hard to ever fully move on from her time at the club and what it meant to see a top-level attacking force play for us when we needed that quality the most.
The 2019/20 season was a struggle. CD Tacón bled goals, conceding 48 — a figure that was the worst in the league. It was their offense that kept them above the drop zone and landed them in 10th place.
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Jakobsson was the most important and productive part of that offense, recording 7 goals and 8 assists. But it was her incredible ball carrying and dribbling ability that captured the imaginations of supporters. She put the team on her back time and time again and set up lofty expectations for her second year at Madrid.
Perhaps they were unfair. Jakobsson was almost always played out of position — on the left or as a striker instead of out wide on the right — and the load she had to bear created a different trade-off between volume and efficiency than the following year. There was some regression in 2020/21; her explosiveness and ability to create separation did seem to drop a tad and her per minute end-product decreased.
However, 8 goals and 9 assists gives her a total goal contribution only less than Marta Cardona’s (14 goals and 6 assists) and Jakobsson remained essential to Real Madrid’s second place finish. She was just no longer the best player on the team — simply one star among many.
For that reason (among others), Madrid felt comfortable enough to deny the Swede the contract she felt she deserved and parted ways. It didn’t need to happen, but Las Blancas will be fine, as they always have been when moving on from great players. Out goes Sofia; in comes talent like Athenea del Castillo (probably), not to mention the potential that Cardona and Olga Carmona have still yet to achieve.
None of this changes the fact that Sofia Jakobsson is as close to a legend as one can be at a club like Madrid over the course of two seasons. 15 goals; 17 assists; the strike that won Madrid their first El Derbi Madrileño; and a number of unforgettable moments streaking past defenders, twisting them inside-out.