Maite Oroz swivels in a plush leather Tottenham Hotspur-branded chair in the club’s main press conference room. As far as dramatic chair reveals go, the Spain international is no Blofeld. Wearing ripped blue jeans, a baggy white T-shirt and a contagious smile, Oroz’s energy is more Mamma Mia than Bond villain.

As her right hand springs forth for an introduction, the 5ft 1in (156cm) midfielder looks as if she could be devoured by this boardroom chair. But her size is part of her superpower; the ability to look almost harmless on the pitch before doing something laughably good with a football, leaving her opponents contemplating what had just happened.

“I am small,” Oroz tells “But I like a fight.”

Oroz, conducting her first external media interview in English since moving to north London, is speaking less than 24 hours after Tottenham’s 1-0 Women’s Super League (WSL) victory against Leicester City. The win marked the start of the season’s second half and extended Spurs’ unbeaten league run to three matches, placing them three points off Brighton in fifth and eight points off Manchester City in fourth.

It was Oroz’s neat one-two with full-back Amanda Nilden that resulted in the game’s decisive own goal from Leicester goalkeeper Janina Leitzig. While there was still much to be desired from Spurs’ overall performance, the goal was the latest reminder of the quiet but essential role Oroz must play in the team’s hunt for success.

“A brilliant footballer,” is how Spurs head coach Robert Vilahamn described her ahead of the 2-1 League Cup quarter-final defeat against West Ham United on Wednesday. Though still adapting to the English game, the 26-year-old never loses the ball, he said, and “technically can dictate the game”.

Signed in September from Real Madrid, with whom she co-captained and made 146 appearances — the second-most in the team’s history — across four seasons, Oroz is the attacking catalyst Tottenham clearly needed.

A first FA Cup final last season was a historic milestone, but the 4-0 demolition by Manchester United that day and a sixth-place finish in the league (19 points off Arsenal in third) was a monument to the gap that separated Vilahamn’s side and the top teams in the division.

Summer departures of creative stars Grace Clinton (on loan from United last season) and Celin Bizet (signed by United) meant bridging that gap became a greater challenge. Oroz was viewed as the necessary midfield fulcrum through which Vilahamn’s possession-based style could tick, thus allowing other players such as Drew Spence, Eveliina Summanen and January signing Olivia Holdt to fill the creative hole left by the summer exits.

Early training sessions suggested this plan, while requiring an adjustment period, had wings. Oroz’s composure and timing on the ball stood out, as did her ability to tangle her team-mates’ ankles if they attempted to disrupt her. But a soft tissue injury sustained in October sidelined her for five weeks; what transpired was a torrid spell in the league for Spurs, who suffered heavy defeats to United (3-0), Chelsea (5-2), Manchester City (4-0) and Arsenal (3-0) and looked frail in possession and exposed in defence.

For Oroz, that period was brutal.

“I was sat next to Anna (Csiki) on the bench,” says Oroz. “In those last minutes, I just wanted to be playing. It’s so hard watching from the bench. I need to keep playing more games. I need time to adapt to the intense transition football here and to build relationships with my team-mates. But I’m getting there. I feel like I know more how the other players play. For me the most important thing is to collaborate, to help the team score and win games and titles.”

Her journey to north London is a rapid adventure that Oroz capers through with enviable simplicity. First, she was chasing after her older brother and other boys playing football in the village square of Huarte, in Navarre, northern Spain. Then, aged 12, she began playing for Osasuna, her hometown club, before moving to Atletico Bilbao four years later. At 22, in 2020, she joined Real Madrid’s first women’s team. “And now,” Oroz says, finalising the whistle-stop tour of her life with a grin, “I am at Tottenham.”

Francisco Punal, the former Osasuna defensive midfielder, was the only professional footballer to have hailed from Huarte. If other girls shared her love for football, Oroz never saw them.

But the metronomic rhythm Oroz possessed was prescient. Atletico Bilbao needed to play only one match against Oroz’s Osasuna before signing the midfielder. After one season with the first team, Oroz was dubbed “Spain’s new pearl” by a local newspaper. At Real Madrid, Oroz’s meticulous control of games earned her comparisons with another diminutive club midfielder: Luca Modric.

“Maybe it can be similar because of our games, the way we play,” Oroz says, her cheeks burning slightly at the suggestion. “For me, it’s a pleasure if they compare me with him. But I need to work on long balls, passing into those spaces beyond.”

Injury has limited Oroz to just nine Tottenham appearances (six in the WSL), but the data supports her observation.

Oroz’s deployment in front of the back four means her game revolves around shuttling the ball between defence and attack, with an additional focus on defence to allow the full-backs to push forward. Yet, only 24.2 per cent of Oroz’s passes have gone forward and just 6.5 per cent have travelled over 35 yards. But when Oroz does launch a ball that distance, she boasts a 78.6 per cent accuracy, trailing only Manchester City’s Jill Roord and team-mate Spence.

“Normally, I’m a player who sees in short passes, but I need to be concentrated and sometimes say, OK, I am going to see the longer pass,” says Oroz.

Honing her skills as a deeper-lying playmaker could also help the 15-cap Spain international in her bid to compete for her country in this summer’s European Championship, though a much-improved second half of the season will be required.

The display against Leicester was positive, but Oroz — along with Nilden and Jessica Naz — was substituted at half-time against West Ham on Wednesday, the midfielder toiling to apply her usual composure. Those around the team remain positive that Oroz will acclimatise. It is also hoped that the availability of Holdt — signed in January from Rosengard but returning to full fitness from a leg fracture sustained in September — will provide her with a better attacking partnership in the centre of the pitch.

“The most important thing for me is playing well. If it comes, I will be very happy,” Oroz says.

Finding happiness wherever she is has been part of the Oroz story. She is player who, at 14, left the local comfort of Osasuna for a two-hour drive to Bilbao, leaving behind weekends filled with “vermu”, time with uncles, aunts, cousins and siblings. Moving to Madrid, a city four hours from home, meant “learning to live with myself,” she says.

The UK is simply another frontier and, as she herself says, northern Spain also gets cold in the winter. And while darkness descends on Britain at 4pm at this time of year, everyone, “always asks how you’re doing and if you’re OK. They’re so nice!”

Her boyfriend has moved with her to England. Her brother and parents are “only a phone call away”, as she is reminded after matches and, in March, they will visit for her 27th birthday. Discovering a Spanish restaurant in Soho, the heart of London’s West End, has secured her paella fix and she can conduct a full interview in English, a triumph celebrated with a subtle fist-pump.

It is a glimpse into the dauntless positivity and borderline childlike vim that has endeared Oroz to so many at her club. There is also her importance to the team. If there is one player upon whom Spurs’ success rests, it is Oroz.

This article originally appeared in The Athletic.

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