Well the better team won!Spain beat Germany 1-0 thanks to Torres (what a player).Finally it was a breath of fresh air and the tournament overall was better compared to the 2006 World Cup. Spain did what other teams did not do to the Germans, when the Spaniards lost the ball they quickly recovered by taking on the man with the ball and even got two players to mark the German with the ball.
Spain showed balance from the start of the tournament and unlike the Dutch who launched their campaign like a rocket and after that fizzled out, Spain was consistent all the way. Their only so called "bad" match was against Italy and even that was a draw, the unbeaten match now runs for 22 matches. The Germans were put in their place and only Croatia and Spain did that, Turkey alas, you could say did the same thing, but putting the ball in the net is what counts.
Marcos Senna the Brasilian becomes the first South American to win a European championship with Spain. Luis Aragones was right in not picking the overated Raul and this proved a master stroke and even handled that Torres substitution incident well (Torres refused to shake hands with Aragones when he came off in a preliminary group match). The 69 year old Aragones proved that age is no barrier and it is good to see nice guys winning.
Spain now can be considered a football powerhouse, their success as defending World Futsal champions, European Futsal champions and European Football Champions will only spur them to further success, I see Spain a new force in the future. The debate about the better league in the world and whether foreigners are good for the game takes a new turn now.
Since 1982 (when they hosted the World Cup) when Spain lost to Northern Ireland in a group match, they have always been underachievers, things seemed more gloomy when they lost to South korea in the 2006 World Cup in Japan/ Korea, but true champions bounce back and now that tag of underachievers has been brushed off, though Xavi the playmaker was named as the player of the tournament I think this Spanish team contributed well, even the reserves played a stirring role in this Euro.
Overall it was nice to see that this Euro was full of goals and teams were mostly on the attack accept for Greece and they rightly deserved to go out. Even Morten Olsen an ex-player and manager of Denmark and a member of the UEFA Technical team analysing the tournament said it was nice to see attacking football make a comeback.
The last Euro was a shambles and a team like Greece won and it was nice to see one touch football and skill coming back to the forefront, of course not in the brilliance of yesteryear, but hey!!...it is start and things do change!
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