Spain vs Germany

Instead of match analysis, I'm just going to try to get to the bottom of my views about Spain. Ultimately, I don't like Spain.

I have made no attempt in the blog to hide the fact that I don't like the Spanish national football team. It's not easy to explain why; they are capable of scintillating football that few other teams could equal, I am a fan of football and someone who feels they can appreciate good play, therefore I should like them. The meta-narrative (it cannot be underestimated how important his is in the watching of top-level sport) of the Spanish team is fairly good as well: a team who have bottled it for a long time finally come to terms with their big name players and manage to blend them into a successful unit, at the same time getting rid of their best-known and perhaps most talented player (Raul), and manage to become the opposite of chokers. It's great to see a team change like this one has; at the last World Cup Spain were easily one of the better teams, but they did not have the bottle to perform when it counted. Now they do, and this should be admired. However, I just don't like Spain.

I used to like Spain, back when they bottled big tournaments: I was gutted when they were robbed in South Korea, desperate for them to beat Spain at Euro 2000. But I don't like them now. I sometimes think there's something joyless in their play, and they have never completely taken a team apart in the way that they dismantled Russia twice in the Euros, or the way Germany have gone through teams here. The constant possession means that the Spanish control games, but they are not exciting games, and you knew sitting down to watch Spain vs Paraguay that it was not going to be a pulsating encounter, unless Paraguay managed to take the lead.

And it's not just the fact that Spain are vastly superior to their opponents that make the match dull. I quite warmed to Brazil, who played perhaps the most defensively orientated football in their history. I could claim that I found some of the interplay between Kaka and Robinho sensational, and look at the Luis Fabiano goal against Chile and say "this is why I like watching this Brazil play", but the truth is that the Spain goals against Portugal and Paraguay were no less cutting than Brazil's. Spain have played football at times that is as good as anyone else in the tournament; I just don't like Spain.

I admire the possession football, I really do. In an age of counter attack, where the priority is on defensive solidity and attacking from deep a la Holland or Brazil, or Mourinho's Inter, it is courageous of Spain to attempt to control the game through possession. And they are very good at it: when they take the lead, they win. This has been the case for what 4 years, 3 years? However, whilst when the ball is moved quickly they can slice teams apart, the majority of possession is slow and around midfield, and I cannot profess to finding it exciting. Truth is, I can't be arsed to watch it when I'm drunk. And it's the World Cup, I'm going to be drunk. I might admire it, but I just don't like watching Spain play.

My biggest problem with Spain though, is not something that they can do anything about: it is the fawning fucking media. Sickening broadsheet toadyism, the constant online wanking of tactic nazis, and most of all the BBC; how these bastards have the nerve to present a series of 1-0 wins as genius and a victory for attacking football is beyond me. Simply put, these cunts could make me dislike my own fucking family with five minutes of hindsight based blathering.

So perhaps it is not Spain's fault entirely; they are merely playing technically excellent football that wins matches, and responding to the pressure in a way that decades worth of their countrymen could only dream about. I am basically 97% certain that on Sunday, Spain will lift the World Cup. But while they continue to get a very public media blowjob, they will never earn the most important thing: my heart.