Alexia Putellas has won two Ballons d'Or and a World Cup, and on Saturday afternoon at the Copperjax Community Stadium she added a goal in the Women's Super League, which is a smaller thing on paper and a considerable one for the club that signed her. London City Lionesses beat Brighton 2-0 and sit second in the table.
A goal that came from a half-clearance
Brighton failed to get the ball out of their box on 29 minutes. Putellas was waiting on the edge of it. The finish went low into the bottom corner and there was nothing complicated about any of it, which is often the case with her; the difficult part is the standing still in the right place while everyone else runs about.
It stayed at one for a long time. Brighton had their moment six minutes after the goal when Emily Murphy got up to a looping cross and headed it against the crossbar, with Kiko Seike volleying the rebound wide. London City hit the same woodwork themselves on 55 through a Freya Godfrey header. The second goal did not arrive until the 92nd minute, when Delphine Cascarino broke away and squared it for Lucia Corrales to tap in.
Putellas at 32, in a new league
She is 32 and she left Barcelona this summer on a free transfer after 14 years and 38 trophies, ten of them league titles. That is the kind of CV that usually precedes a slow farewell somewhere undemanding. Instead she has started every London City match this season, was taken off on 73 minutes here with the game controlled, and has now scored in a competition she joined less than three months ago.
The wider point is what her arrival says about where the WSL sits. Players of her standing used to leave England for Spain. This one went the other way, to a newly promoted side, and she is playing every week.
Brighton still waiting
The Seagulls are tenth with two points and have yet to win a league match this season. They were not poor in south London and the Murphy header was a genuine chance to change the afternoon, but a team creating that little in the final third is going to spend the autumn looking anxiously down the table.
London City, meanwhile, have three wins from four and are three points behind Manchester City at the top. For a club in its first WSL campaign that is a remarkable start, and Saturday was the day their most famous signing finally got on the scoresheet.
Match facts: London City Lionesses 2-0 Brighton and Hove Albion, Copperjax Community Stadium, Saturday 26 September 2026, Women's Super League. Scorers: Alexia Putellas 29 minutes, Lucia Corrales 92 minutes. Putellas, 32, joined on a free transfer from Barcelona in July and was replaced by Maria Perez on 73 minutes. London City are second, three points behind Manchester City. Brighton are tenth on two points and still without a win.
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