Spain 3.0, Yamine Lamal’s Soda Pop & The Brashness Of Youth — La Roja March To The Final Of Euro 2024

Spain show silky football armed with the fearlessness of youth can get you to the final of Euro 2024

“Invent yourself & then reinvent yourself,” urged a fading Charles Bukowski in his baritone register as he read out his poem ‘No Leaders Please’ through a microphone on a dreary night, perhaps engulfed in creative destruction or drunken bedlam, but tonight Spain truly did reinvent themselves.

Thinking outside the box, innovation & reinvention drive the rise & fall of most commercial enterprises worldwide, but this is football & on the pitch, it means business too. So maybe Marcelo Bielsa’s timely comments that hit out at football becoming less sexy, more banal & hyper-commercialised also came at just the right time. Invent yourself, and then, reinvent yourself.

In more ways than one, this Spanish side lacks the glitz and glamour of Spanish sides of old, no Xavi, no Iniesta, no Busquets in midfield instead the eerily ever-present Rodri & Fabian Ruiz — that one guy from the latter stages of a five-a-side game with some deft touches & slick passes to make up for the lack of industry. No Torres or Villa up front, but journeyman striker Alvaro Morata, who has led the line admirably & captained his country duly.