Tuesday, May 1, 2012

Spain: Must beat team!

MADRID,  (Reuters):  Spain shook off the tag of inveterate also-rans to triumph at Euro 2008 and winning a first World Cup two years later secured them undisputed status as the team to beat in international soccer.
However they will have to re-write soccer’s record books if they are to keep their European title in Poland and Ukraine this summer. No country has ever retained the Henri Delauney trophy and no country, on any continent, has won three major tournaments in a row.
The Iberian nation used to be haunted by the “curse of the quarters” – at the European Championships of 1996 and 2000 and at the World Cups of 1994 and 2002 the last eight had proved a bitter stumbling block.
Fans feared the worst at Euro 2008 when then-world champions Italy battled to a 0-0 draw to force a quarter-final penalty shootout but that was when Spain’s luck changed and Iker Casillas’s saves sent them through.
Released from their jinx and flush with self-belief they swept on to the title and followed up their success in Austria and Switzerland with a less spectacular, but equally efficient, performance to win the World Cup in South Africa.
Under coach Vicente del Bosque, they continue to win plaudits for their slick possession play, attacking flair and solid defence and are firm favourites to become the first nation to win back-to-back continental titles with a World Cup in between.
“Of course we are favourites due to the fact that we are the reigning European and world champions and it seems that is something we can’t shake off,” a smiling Del Bosque said in an interview with Reuters in March.
“But Netherlands and Germany, who were second and third in the World Cup, are also clear favourites, all the more so because of their impeccable Euro 2012 qualifying runs,” the former Real Madrid coach and player added.
“Then you have England, Italy, France, Portugal, they all have excellent players.
“And in these relatively short championships it can happen that any country comes into form and wins it, as happened with Greece in Portugal in 2004.”

source: The Sun

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