Hard times for Spain. Some people saw them winning the whole cup again. Well, not me by the way. But seriously they got really buttfuc*ed this time. 7:1 goals and off the tournament after 2 matches. With players who won the CL and such players from Barca this is something they won't forget soon. Well, even better for Italy. Spain is one of the only teams that can outperform Italy in such tournaments when Italy will improve during the tournament. FORZA ITALIA!
Congrats to Chile, they played better and with more intensity from the start.
Vicente del Bosque's biggest mistake was using Barca's system of play. They haven't win anything in 12 months and they fluked that anyway. 1 trophy in 2 years showed signs it was done. The other big mistake was leaving winners out of his squad, like Carvajal and Navas. Both provide width, pace and cornering prowess.
Spain in this World Cup reminded me of their Under 23s Olympic 2012 team. Plenty of talent, just not playing a style of football that actually works for them.
Spain don't need to worry too much, they only need to look at either Madrid side to know how to play a better style of football in today's game. Bayern adopted Barca's style thanks to Pep and they got smashed by Real, it is done.
GK; De Gea, Guaita, Andrés Fernández, Adrián & Sergio Asenjo. All 27 or under. Even; Casillas, Diego López, José Reina & Victor Valdés could go 1 or 2 more tournaments.
RB/LB; Carvajal, Montoya, Azpilicueta, Jordi Alba and Alberto Moreno. All under 25.
CB; Ramos & Piqué, both under 30, both winners. Iñigo Martínez, Víctor Ruíz, Álvaro Domínguez, Marc Bartra, Botía, Fontàs and Borja López. All under 25, all good defenders with decent potential.
CDM; Busquets, Martinez, Javi García & Oriol Romeu. Tops players, under 27.
CM; Illarramendi, Ander Herrera, Sergi Roberto, Rubén Pardo and Saúl. All under 24. Even Granero & Parejo if needed.
RM/LM; Pablo Sarabia, Rubén García, Suso & Bernat. Top young players coming through.
CAM; Mata, Isco, Thiago, Koke, Muniaín, Adrián & Sergio Canales. All 25 or under. Silva & Carzola under 30 still.
RW/LW; Navas & Pedro, both under 28. Bojan & Deulofeu both under 22. Diego Capel & Cristian Tello, both under 25.
CF/ST; Jesé, Morata & Rodrigo, all under 23.
Spain has plenty of talent, the biggest catalogue in world football. They'll be back, they just need to chance!
Spain in this World Cup reminded me of their Under 23s Olympic 2012 team. Plenty of talent, just not playing a style of football that actually works for them.
HAHAHA.. it's the same team that won the WC and Euro!
Add some new and young players into the squad and they will dominate int football for another 10 years, playing this style of football.
The under 23s Olympic team win everything leading up to that competition too! They used their same system and the team they played worked them out.
Same thing happened here, Spain's tactics have been found out and he shouldn't suit them anymore. Alonso, and Iniesta and Xavi don't have the same time on the ball as they once did. Teams work to close them down, not to mention they've got older, especially Xavi, he looked out of it almost instantly. Alonso wasn't comfortable from the 1st minute yesterday either.
del Bosque should have gone with; Casillas; Azpilicueta, Ramos, Piqué, Alba; Busquets, Martinez, Silva, Mata, Iniesta; Fàbregas. False 9, it worked fine in Euro 2012 and the older players have been replaced with top younger ones. Mata > Xavi, Martinez > Alonso.
Agreed, Spain have plenty of talent under 25 in every position possible. Euro 2016 will be interesting.
So basically who's going to win this World Cup? Germany or the Dutch judging from what we've seen. Picking out the bandwagoners from a World Cup isn't as easy as seeing them in leagues, there's a lot of latinos or hispanics that wanted Spain to win in 2010 and in this world cup, depends on where you're from.
hell no!! im a latino and i wanted holand to win in 2010 ive always said spain didnt deserved to be champions, it was supose to be holand since 2010, anyways im realiztic but germany will win
I predicted that Spain would make it to top four this time around. Boy, was i wrong on that one! I think Germany and Brazil are big contenders to win. Argentina and Netherlands may do well too.
Keep in mind that they are playing in Brazil so the climate suits the South American teams the best.
Netherlands has been very good but not so outstanding as people seem to think in my opinion. I think they crushed Spain 5-1 largely because Spain made lots of awful mistakes and lost their fighting spirit. The 2-3 against Australia was more indicative of Netherlands' level I think.
if Brazil has a chance then Mexico also has a chance, ofcourse Brazil should be eliminated already if it hadnt been for FIFA's help helping them win agains croatia
I think your wrong about the netherlands. It wasnt because the netherlands were so bad that they barely beat australia. It was because Australia put on a hell of a show and the Netherlands were not expecting it. Both teams played great that match but Australia surprised me.
Well, Australia surely played very energetically in that match. But still, Australia is at #62 in FIFA rankings, Netherlands's at #15. There's just a huge difference in skill level between those teams, so I was expecting more from Netherlands, even if they were against Aussies in top condition and spirit.
Sad day for Spain. Have given us so much great football in the last good few years. It was great to watch while it lasted. Time to move Iniesta, Casillas and Xavi on and give players like Fabregas, Koke, Mata and Carzola a chance. Best of luck to Chile in the coming games, they look solid.
It felt like Spain tried to pass around faster than usual and it only ended up causing them to lose the ball and get sloppy. Sucks to see Spain go even though I wasn't going for them.
HAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHHA HOME YOU GO!!! ULTIMATE PRIZE MY ASS. GUESS WHO GOT CRUSHED AND IS GOING TO GET OWNED BY AUSTRALIA AS WELL? SPAIN! WORK ON YOUR FOOTBALL KNOWLEDGE HAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAAH
It's sad when people are so bitter about life they have to do this.
It's funny too because Spain are still holders till the final. They still hold the Euro Championship. Madrid has the Champions League and Sevilla has the Europa League. Spain currently hold all major international titles at club & international level.
Let them be bitter Nes, they'll understand good football one day (or maybe not)!
Thank the powers that be that Tiki-Taka is finally dead! A win for football in general today, as we will not be made to watch such boring football anymore!
Such a sad, sad comment. When Barcelona and Spain were ripping teams apart in the last years everyone (except people whos teams were getting destroyed) was loving it. It's pretty pathetic to say it is a win for football when the style of play that brought arguably the best club side ever so much success isn't what it used to be. It took special players like Xavi, Iniesta and Messi to make that style happen. Two of them are just getting on unfortunately and can't keep up with their own standards. We won't see players like them again for a long while yet.
As asmith said, sad comment, tiki taka is beautiful when played right, when played bold, when used by talented teams with the purpose of scoring. And tiki taka isn't dead, it will be seen soon again.
HAHHAHAHAHAHHA RGB! THERE GOES YOUR PRECIOUS HORRIBLE SPAIN! LEARN MORE ABOUT FOOTBALL! YOU DON'T KNOW ANYTHING ABOUT IT HAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHA HAHA
What do you get out of posting like this? I assume you're not a jabbering mental patient in real life, so why post like one? You realise how stupid this makes you look, right?
I'm glad they are out tbh, such a boring team to watch, it's also boring when a country dominates for too long, hopefully a new country wins this year like the Netherlands, first choice would be England but I'm a realist!
What a shock, teams know how to deal with their style of play now.. Casillas was shocking, again. RGB the plastic fan (English but supports Spain) is a bit quiet, I wonder where his stats are now.
Now back to the drawing board for Spain...
wonder which team all the 2010 bandwagoners will jump to now.
any guesses?
I predicted that Spain would make it to top four this time around. Boy, was i wrong on that one! I think Germany and Brazil are big contenders to win. Argentina and Netherlands may do well too.
Sad day for Spain. Have given us so much great football in the last good few years. It was great to watch while it lasted. Time to move Iniesta, Casillas and Xavi on and give players like Fabregas, Koke, Mata and Carzola a chance. Best of luck to Chile in the coming games, they look solid.
It felt like Spain tried to pass around faster than usual and it only ended up causing them to lose the ball and get sloppy. Sucks to see Spain go even though I wasn't going for them.