Over the past year, we’ve looked back at the first 16 triumphant teams in the European Championship.
The list goes the Soviet Union in 1960, Spain in 1964, Italy in 1968, West Germany in 1972, Czechoslovakia in 1976, West Germany again in 1980, France in 1984, the Netherlands in 1988, Denmark in 1992, a united Germany in 1996, France again in 2000, Greece in 2004, Spain in 2008 and again in 2012, Portugal in 2016 and Italy again in 2021.
So with Euro 2024 now in the books, why not complete the list before attention reverts to the club game? Here’s the Spain side who were crowned European champions in Berlin on Sunday.
Introduction
Spain have become the first nation to win the men’s European Championship four times, following successes in 1964, 2008 and 2012. They did it through ideology as much as individuals, having begun the tournament as fifth-favourites, under a manager almost unheard of outside Spanish football. But they won all seven games — one did require extra time — to take the trophy in convincing fashion.
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The manager
As a general rule, the European Championship is not a tournament for high-profile managers.
Luis de la Fuente, like previous Euros winning coaches Ferruccio Valcareggi (1968), Helmut Schon (1972), Jupp Derwall (1980), Michel Hidalgo (1984), Richard Moller Nielsen (1992) and Roger Lemerre (2ooo), was essentially an internal appointment. His most notable club managerial experience was an 11-game spell in charge of Alaves over a decade beforehand, but he won European Championships for Spain with the under-19 and under-21 sides before being handed the full national team job following the 2022 World Cup. He turned 63 during these Euros.
After a difficult start, which included a 2-0 defeat against Scotland early in Euro 2024 qualification, De la Fuente recovered to win the Nations League final last summer, and gradually asserted his authority. De la Fuente is a devout Catholic, a bullfighting fan and claimed he only needed three hours of sleep a day throughout the tournament. “I think he’s built a family here, which is basically what has brought us to this point,” backup striker Joselu said before yesterday’s final against England.
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In that sense, he is reminiscent of Vicente del Bosque, coach of Spain’s 2010 World Cup winners and triumphant Euros side two years later — a father figure as much as a tactician.
Tactics
Whereas Del Bosque’s 2012 side played patient passing football, the Spain of Euro 2024 were notable for their directness. The use of two ‘proper’ wingers defined them in the tournament’s early stages, with 22-year-old Nico Williams storming down the left flank and Lamine Yamal, 16 for most of the competition, darting inside from the right. They combined for the opening goal in the final.
In Alvaro Morata, also the captain, there was an old-school centre-forward, who sometimes lacked finesse but compensated with hard work and physicality. Three pushed forward aggressively from midfield, with Fabian Ruiz breaking into the channels and Dani Olmo, who replaced an injured Pedri from early in the quarter-final on, playing between the lines and often running in behind during that last-eight tie against Germany. Rodri mopped up behind that pair, and also covered for the full-backs, Dani Carvajal and Marc Cucurella.
The question is whether this constituted a genuine change in national identity.
After all, Spain still used a 4-3-3, a high line, and there was a commitment to dominating the game in the opposition half. It seemed in keeping with the way most Spanish youth sides have played over previous years, whereas the Euro 2012 side was an exaggerated reflection of possession-based play, which essentially used two midfield trios because of the relative paucity of attacking options.
This side was still distinctly Spanish, and also reminiscent of their women’s side, who won the World Cup last year.
You might be surprised to learn…
This was not a tournament of established superstars, summed up by the fact its winners didn’t have a single player on the 30-man shortlist for the previous year’s Ballon d’Or.
And while previous Spain sides were based around a core from El Clasico rivals Barcelona and Real Madrid, the club who contributed the most players to this squad are Real Sociedad, with five, including their matchwinner in the final, Mikel Oyarzabal. The four Barcelona representatives had an average age of 20. Only one Barcelona player (Yamal) and one from Real Madrid (Carvajal) started the final.
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It’s also notable that Spain’s centre-back pairing are not really Spanish. Robin Le Normand and Aymeric Laporte were born and raised in France, moved to the Basque country to play for Real Sociedad and Athletic Bilbao respectively, and only qualified for Spain through residency, both at the age of 26.
Key player
Such was Spain’s dominance, you could probably highlight five of their team as candidates here.
Wingers Williams and Yamal were unplayable at times. Ruiz was perhaps the only player at the tournament who was capable of both controlling a game and helping to decide it in the final third. Olmo’s enforced introduction provided Spain with a different dimension, and he scored in both the quarter-final and the semis.
The official player of the tournament is Rodri, the world’s outstanding holding midfielder, although the best demonstration of Spain’s brilliance is that he was substituted at half-time in the final because of injury, and his colleagues subsequently won the game without him. This was a true team.
The final
A meeting with pre-tournament bookmakers’ favourites England, who had been underwhelming throughout the competition, and were fortunate to avoid any of the other six pre-tournament favourites (France, Germany, Portugal, Spain and Italy) in the weaker half of the knockout-phase draw.
Spain seemed in command throughout the first half without creating any serious chances. The enforced departure of Rodri at the interval convinced De la Fuente to change to 4-2-3-1 by moving Ruiz alongside substitute Martin Zubimendi, and Spain opened the scoring almost instantly when the second half began, with Yamal setting up fellow winger Williams.
England arguably had more strength in depth, and Cole Palmer came off the bench to drill home an equaliser with 17 minutes of the 90 to go. At that point, you slightly feared for Spain, who were probably guilty of making too big a defensive step in the previous two rounds and abandoning any attacking threat. But they recovered well, scored again on 86 minutes, and deserved their win.
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Defining moment
The European Championship has a habit of substitute forwards suddenly becoming the hero.
Oliver Bierhoff hadn’t scored in 92 minutes of action across Germany’s first five games at Euro 96 until he got both their goals in the final. David Trezeguet of France had only netted in a dead-rubber final group game when he came off the bench to smash home the golden-goal winner four years later. Eder had played just 13 minutes in the tournament before he was sent on as Portugal’s Plan C, but managed to define the Euro 2016 final.
This time, it was Oyarzabal who won it as a 68th-minute replacement for Morata.
More a winger than a striker, he nevertheless showed brilliant centre-forward play to come short and receive, sending the ball out to Cucurella before timing his run perfectly into the box to finish the return pass. He seemed slightly uncertain whether the goal would stand amid the threat of a VAR decision — but with just three minutes of the 90 remaining, it felt like game over.
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Were they clearly the best team?
Yes. Spain were the most impressive performers in the group stage, battering Croatia 3-0 in the opener, and their best performance actually came in a narrow 1-0 victory over defending champions Italy, secured with an own goal, in match two. Their 1-0 win against Albania to complete the group phase, with a rotated XI, showed how comfortable all their players were in the system.
In the knockout rounds, they survived a brief scare when Georgia took an early lead, but then won 2-1 three times in a row against genuine contenders: Germany, France and England.
Spain had some weaknesses, mainly because of the positional bravery of their midfield, but they were certainly the most entertaining side at the tournament and defeated the two finalists from Euro 2020 (Italy and England), the top two European sides from the 2022 World Cup (third-placed Croatia and runners-up France) and the host nation (Germany).
They have been the best European Championship winners since Spain’s previous generation triumphed 12 years ago, and sit up alongside them and West Germany 1972, France 1984 and France 2000 as sides who were unanimously admired across the continent.
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Decisive De la Fuente, Morata’s leadership, Yamal and Williams’ bond - how Spain won Euro 2024
(Top photo: Getty Images)
