While Spain’s 2010 Squad Is A Standard, This Version May Have A Better Story

Close your eyes and picture Spain in a World Cup final. You see Andrés Iniesta ghosting into the box in Johannesburg. You see Xavi conducting, David Villa finishing, Sergio Ramos flying down the right, Iker Casillas saving Spain’s life against Arjen Robben. That team won everything from 2008 to 2012 and changed how the sport thinks about itself. 

It was the team with the most recognizable style: Tiki-Taka.

This Spain is not that Spain. And after Tuesday at Dallas Stadium, it doesn’t need to be. Luis de la Fuente’s side dismantled France, 2-0, in the semifinal, and “dismantled” is being kind to France. 

A Mikel Oyarzabal penalty, won by Lamine Yamal, opened it in the 22nd minute. Pedro Porro, a right back, played a give-and-go with Dani Olmo and slotted the second in the 58th. Kylian Mbappé and the most feared attack in the tournament were held to almost nothing. It was a suffocation, administered the Spanish way.

Here’s the number that should terrify Argentina or England on Sunday: 1. That’s how many goals Spain has conceded in six matches. Italy arrived at the 2006 final with the same figure (granted, an own goal by Cristian Zaccardo against the USA) and left with the trophy. 

(Photo by Hannah Peters – FIFA/FIFA via Getty Images)

Championship teams are usually built on this exact foundation, and nobody noticed Spain was building it because everyone was too busy waiting for the fireworks on the other end.

Because let’s be honest about what we all expected: We thought Lamine Yamal would be one of the big stars of this tournament. Instead, the 19-year-old has just one goal through seven games, perhaps lingering remnants of the injury he suffered during the La Liga season prevent him from achieving his very best. 

Read that again. 

Spain is in a World Cup final, and its biggest star’s sole goal came way back in the group stage. If you’d offered that scenario in May, you’d have been looked at like you had three heads. There’s still no true signature Yamal moment, as it’s doubtful we’ll be gushing over that goal against Saudi Arabia in 20 years. He’s been dangerous, he won the penalty Tuesday, he had a finish chalked off for offside. 

But the eruption hasn’t come. Even more impressively, Spain hasn’t needed it.

That’s the point. This team hasn’t even played its best soccer yet, and it’s one win from the trophy.

One of the stars has been Rodri, who controlled the France match from start to finish and has been the tournament’s Mr. Reliable. The captain doesn’t do highlight reels. He doesn’t go viral on TikTok. He doesn’t frost his tips. What Rodri does is 90 minutes of making the game look easy while the opponent slowly runs out of ideas.

And the defense deserves flowers. Pau Cubarsí, still a teenager himself who wouldn’t legally be able to celebrate these victories here in the USA with a beer, treated the France front line like a training exercise. Unai Simón has been unbeatable. Marc Cucurella looked unfazed against the generational opponents running at him. 

The fullbacks bombed forward against that legendary French counterattack all night and never once looked worried about the space behind them. Pedro Porro’s goal was the reward. That takes either arrogance or total structural trust. With this Spain, it’s the latter.

Remember where this program was. From 2014 onward, the World Cup became a house of horrors: a group-stage exit as defending champions, then back-to-back round of 16 eliminations on penalties, the last one against Morocco in 2022. A generation of Spanish teams passed the ball beautifully and went home early. 

Euro 2024 broke the spell. Sunday can bury it.

The 2010 Spain team remains the standard. (Photo by Laurence Griffiths/Getty Images)

The golden generation had more individual talent. No rational soul disputes that. But that team needed extra time to win its final. This one has been so efficient, so ruthless in the back, that its best attacking player has taken a back seat to scoring, and it barely matters.

Villa, Xavi, Iniesta, Ramos, Casillas. Those names built a legacy. They created an international dynasty. On Sunday for the final, the new kids on the block get the chance to start their own. 

And if Yamal finally picks that stage for his big moment, this story writes its perfect ending.