Spain lifts World Cup for first time

Spain finally crawled out from underneath its tag as World Cup underachievers by winning the trophy in their 13th tournament with a 1-0 win over Holland in Johannesburg, South Africa on July 11th. However, it did take them extra time do it and against a 10-man team at the time as midfielder Andres Iniesta scored his second goal of the tournament in the 116th minute to seal the win. Dutch defender Johnny Heitinga was sent off the pitch after receiving his second yellow card just minutes earlier.

It was a physical game right from the get go, but while it might have appeared to be a classic matchup on paper, it didn’t turn out that way on the pitch. In fact, it followed the disturbing trend of the past four World Cup Final games as it didn’t live up to the hype at all.

Many fans may have been dozing for the first few minutes, but Dutch keeper Maarten Stekelenburg woke them up with a fine diving save to thwart a powerful header from Sergio Ramos in the sixth minute. Ramos got his head to a free kick from Xavi and headed it down towards the bottom corner of the net, but Stekelenburg dove to his right and knocked it away.

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The tackles were coming in fast and furious during the first half, but not the scoring chances. Nigel De Jong may have been fortunate to stay on the pitch as his high boot caught Xabi Alonso in the chest, but the Dutch midfielder escaped with a yellow card instead of a red. His was the fifth yellow of the game already by the 30-minute mark.

Holland showed some creativity in the 37th minute on a clever corner kick when winger Arjen Robben rolled the ball back to midfielder Mark van Bommell and he either purposely or unwittingly sent it into the box to unmarked defender Joris Mathijsen who then completely mis-kicked it. The Dutch got some confidence from this though, and Spanish keeper and captain Iker Casillas was forced to dive low to keep out a drive from Robben just before half time.

Holland started the second half with a bit more purpose and had a golden opportunity to jump out into the lead in the 62nd minute when midfielder Wesley Sneijder sent Robben in all alone on Casillas. Robben took a shot on the oncoming Casillas, but the keeper deflected it wide of the net with his foot.

Villa had a chance to get Spain on the board in the 70th minute when a cross from winger Jesus Nava found him in front of the net, but Villa couldn’t add to his total of five tournament goals as his shot was deflected behind the goal. Defender Carles Puyol then missed another opportunity eight minutes later as his header was thundered over the net.

Robben broke in on Casillas again in the 82nd minute as he sped by Puyol, but it looked like the Spaniard did enough to impede him and Casillas came out to make another fine save.

Spain started the extra time period strongly and Cesc Fabregas was sent in by Iniesta on what looked like a sure goal only to have Stekelenburg come racing out of the net to deny him. Spain kept the pressure on, but some fine defensive play by the Dutch kept the game goalless. However, everything fell apart for Holland after captain Giovanni Van Bronckhorst was substituted in the 105th minute for some strange reason as the defender was having an excellent game. Four minutes later, Heitinga was shown his second yellow card after hauling down Iniesta outside of the box.

Seven minutes after that, Iniesta took a pass from Fabregas in the penalty area and hammered a right-footer from about eight yards that Stekelenburg got his hand to, but couldn’t keep out of the net.

Referee Howard Webb of England is bound to come under criticism from some quarters, but to be fair, he did a fine job and the 14 yellow cards he handed out were all deserved.

While Spain are now champions of Europe and the world, let’s not forget they got out of the group round by the skin of their teeth after losing to Switzerland in their first game. And If Robben’s finishing touch matched his speed we might be singing another tune right now. So if there is a gap between Spain and Holland, and the rest of the world for that matter, it’s a very narrow one at best.

However, the Spanish put the ball in the net when it counted and all credit to them.

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