Young guns fire up new belief in shamed Spain
CONDOLENCES to Spanish soccer for the losses it has suffered in 2014 might be premature.
The manner in which it surrendered the World Cup, followed by a loss in Slovakia in European Championship qualifying last month, brought all manner of condemnation to the national team.
Thus it was fitting that their year ended with defeat to freshly crowned world champions Germany this week — their fifth loss in 12 matches in 2014 — ending an unbeaten run of 34
He shifted it to his right foot and, from 75 feet out, struck it handsomely and deliberately into the top corner
home games.
Coach Vicente del Bosque is integrating a new generation of players and has plenty of reasons for optimism, with such exciting talent coming through as midfielders Koke, Isco and Thiago Alcantara and forwards Paco Alcacer and Alvaro Morata.
Brazil-born striker Diego Costa will surely find his form on the international stage, and Del Bosque can still call on the vast experience of captain and goalkeeper Iker Casillas, defenders Sergio Ramos and Ger- ard Pique and midfielders Cesc Fabregas, Andres Iniesta and David Silva.
Spain’s next outing is a Euro 2016 qualifier at home to Ukraine at the end of March.
They are currently second in Group C and are three points behind Slovakia after a 2-1 defeat to the Eastern Europeans last month.
La Roja, it has been said, were falling apart. The team was old and Del Bosque was considered past tense. Del Bosque did offer his resignation. It was rejected.
He was told to rebuild the roster with the young talent Spain has been fostering. Many believe that beating Belarus 3-0 at Huelva in southern Spain was the start of that renewal.
It was not the result so much as the performance that mattered. Real Madrid’s Isco started it 18 minutes in with a goal that came from nowhere but the young man’s imagination.
He has emerged through a Spanish system in which all the country’s talents are encouraged to play for national teams that have a tempo, that is about more than just results.
Isco, who started his career at Valencia, and Koke, the rising Atlético Madrid midfielder, are the two players earmarked to be the future, but Isco and Koke do not yet have the experience of Andrés Iniesta, Cesc Fàbregas or David Silva, all of whom were unavailable against Belarus because of injuries.
However, one man’s injury is another man’s opportunity.
And how sweet, how assured, how natural was the combination of Koke and Isco in both of their recent games.
In the game against Belarus there were six defenders around Isco in the 18th minute, but still Koke trusted his teammate enough to pass the ball through them all.
Isco controlled the ball with a touch of his left foot. Then, perfectly balanced in his slim frame, he shifted it to his right foot and, from 75 feet out, struck it handsomely and deliberately into the top corner, between the bar and the post of the Belarus goal.
That was the strike of a young master. Isco and Koke are 22, but that is relatively young in Spanish soccer.
Its players often rise slowly through the system, especially those from the current generation, because of such exciting talent coming through while winning the World Cup in 2010 and the European Championships in 2008 and 2012.
Spain overran Belarus. The chasm between the teams was embarrassing, and Spain missed scoring chances both before and after Pedro, the Barcelona winger, sealed the victory with the third goal.
Del Bosque watched over it on the sidelines, his 63-year-old face as doleful as usual, his demeanor scarcely any different now than when he was being lauded as a World Cup-winning coach or when he was being derided for losing that title.
There had been seven withdrawals by players, for one reason or another, before the game against Belarus.
The coach had said that the players who wanted to play for Spain were there in Huelva.
Del Bosque had been made to say more than he intended.
One of his stalwarts in defence, Sergio Ramos, had sounded off on radio during the build-up to this game, suggesting that the absence of those players because of minor injuries was a betrayal of the commitment that he and others felt towards La Roja.
Ramos was talking about Costa and Fabregas, in particular. He suspected that they were putting their club, Chelsea, before their country. Del Bosque dealt with it in the way that shows his experience.
He didn’t confront Chelsea’s coach, José Mourinho, who, like Del Bosque, had once coached Real Madrid.
“I don’t want to confront anyone,” Del Bosque told reporters. “It is not a sign of weakness.”
He said he left Costa, the Brazilian who this year became a naturalised Spanish striker, off the roster because Costa had missed training because of a groin strain.
He released Fabregas because the player told him his
Ramos was talking about Costa and Fabregas. He suspected they were putting their club, Chelsea, before their country
hamstring was not right.
“Nobody is pulling the wool over our eyes,” Del Bosque said at a news conference before the Huelva game.
“I have to have confidence in the words of players.
“We have run the team well over six years in the right way that you should trust people.”
He trusted fresh, younger men that day — and we glimpsed the future that suggests the Spanish era may not yet be dead and buried. — © The New York Times News Service