Torres celebrates the second of his two goals against Ireland. He's back. |
In the 74th minute of Thursday’s Group C match between Spain and Ireland, Barcelona striker Cesc Fábregas came off the bench for Fernando Torres. Eight minutes later, he received a pass off a corner, took two elegant touches through the haggard Irish defense, and blasted one in off the far post to put the Spaniards up 4-0. He then staged the kind of defiant celebration that says, “I could have been doing this all game.”
For anyone who was wondering just how good this Spain side is, there was the answer.
Through 90+3 minutes of soccer, La Roja made a respectable Ireland squad look entirely unrespectable. Aside from an early long-range chance for Simon Cox, the Irish were wholly outplayed in every facet of the game that doesn’t involve keg stands, at times looking absolutely helpless. For long stretches of the second half, one might have thought Ireland had sent their practice squad to Poland, as there was not a single Irish player who could compete with his Spanish counterparts.
That’s harsh. And for the rest of the Euro 2012 field (and beyond), it is the frightening truth. The match stats only strengthen this fact. Spain possessed the ball for 66% of the game – and even that seems generous toward the Irish – they bombarded goalkeeper Shay Given with 20 shots on goal to his side’s 4, and in a beautifully Spanish manner, finessed and finagled 859 passes about the field. Most of Ireland’s passes, in contrast, ended up on a Spaniard’s foot.
Toward the end of the match, with Ireland trudging through the final compulsory minutes and Spain continuing their ruthless assault on The Boys in Green, thoughts of Murderers’ Row and Jordan’s Bulls and the Red Army came to mind. This Spain team is that good. They’re relentless, they’re pitiless; they’ll knock you down then help you up, just so they can knock you down again. Call it dramatic, but they spare no souls. In the dying minutes, Gerard Piqué was making runs down the right win, bloodthirsty for a goal. In the 90th minute, his defensive partner Álvaro Arbeloa was positioned at the top of the 18’, looking to get in on the fun as well. It was a scene out of a youth league soccer game, when one team is so resolutely better than the other, the scraggly, uncoordinated kid who never plays is put in so he can score his first goal ever. That’s not to call Piqué or Arbeloa scraggly or uncoordinated, but you get the point.
Everything is fast when the Spanish play, but never frenetic. It is calculated, but never the same. It is systematic, and yet ever unpredictable. They have, it seems, meshed the methodical European style of play with the more brazen South American brand, and produced a type of soccer that is, in the words of commentator Ian Darke, “simply brilliant.” This offspring is entirely their own.
Thursday in Poland, it was a bully on the Euro 2012 playground, and doesn’t look to be handing out any free passes the rest of the way. It will be challenged, that’s for sure (think: Germany), but when their bench could beat most of the world’s best, its hard to imagine anyone toppling L'equip d'or. The Golden Team.
That old Spanish nickname was coined years ago in light of their former gold jerseys. In the years since, and certainly in this year’s Euro Cup, it has come to signify a whole lot more.
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