After the rise and subsequent fall of the golden generation, world champion and two-time European champion, the Asturian promotes a new crop of young talents to mark a podium
The numbers speak for themselves. Luis Enrique’s Spain is the second youngest in the history of La Roja in the World Cups (25.87 years). Only in the distant 1934 tournament, played in Mussolini’s Italy, did the Spanish national team present a squad with a lower average age than the current one (25.6). In modern times, the closest to this current generation change took place in Germany 2006. Luis Aragonés’ team had an average age slightly higher than the current one (26.18) and the time perspective allows us to pinpoint the origins of that championship in of the golden age in the Spanish team.
Only the passing of the years and the major tournaments will allow us to look back and identify in this World Cup in Qatar the origins of a period of splendor, but what seems clear based on the analysis of the players and their trajectories , is that something It has been brewing in the Spanish team for the last two years. It is true that very young teams usually do not take the championships, but rather lay the foundations for a successful future. Therein lies the challenge for Luis Enrique’s men, who, in addition to the youth of the team, also have the experience of a handful of already experienced players to aspire to everything in the present.
Two kids like Pedri (19 years old) and Gavi (18) set the pace for this team from midfield, where Spain achieved their most memorable victories. They’re not the only abusively young club, one that includes centre-backs Hugo Guillamón (22) and Eric García (21), trusted by Luis Enrique and with serious potential to become a starter; the left back Alejandro Balde (19), urgently called up after Gayà’s injury and who intends to blatantly challenge the hierarchy of Jordi Alba in the position, and the forwards Ferran Torres (22), Ansu Fati (20) and Yéremy Pino (twenty ). Oddly enough, six out of eight are Barça players, a team also immersed in a phase of regeneration after a virtuous cycle and subsequent fall.
Not everything is youth, divine darling, in this Spanish team. Most of the younger players are from Barça, but the two oldest, Sergio Busquets (34 years old) and Jordi Alba (33), are also from Barcelona. The captain, Busquets, is the oldest in the dressing room in Qatar at 34 years old in July. They are 16 fifths more than those Gavi adds.
They also bring experience César Azpilicueta (33), Dani Carvajal (30), Álvaro Morata (30), Pablo Sarabia (30) and Koke (30). And it is that apart from being already at an advanced stage of their careers, everyone except Morata and Sarabia know what it is to play a World Cup, a differentiator when it comes to competitions. They accumulate in their final stages and decisive matches in the Champions League and the main competitions a high dose of experience on the field that will help young people when the road gets complicated.
The latter are far behind, along with Sergio Busquets and Jordi Alba, the ‘grandparents’ of this Qatari Spain and also the only ones who know what it’s like to lift a trophy with La Roja, one of the longest serving players of the national team. team.
The oldest footballer to have been called up to La Roja is Andoni Zubizarreta, a myth that the fantastic Barça from Cruyff’s Dream Team and then from Valencia who was 36 years and 230 days old on the opening date of the 1998 World Cup. The veteran goalkeeper, who played in the 1986, 1990 and 1994 editions, played all three of Spain’s matches in the tournament with little luck as Spain fell in the group stage.
Cañizares is the other goalkeeper who entered the World Cup list in 2006 after turning 36. All of them returned to the list at least twice more, except Chile’s leading striker and goalkeeper.
He doesn’t play, although he could very well because of his physical form that he has shaped through kicks and passes, but Luis Enrique also combines a lot of experience on the bench with an age that allows him to be at his best. Born on May 8, 1970, at the age of 52, he is the seventeenth oldest coach of the 32 World Cup in Qatar.
Javier Clemente was younger when he first took on the challenge of a World Cup as a Spanish coach in the United States in 1994 (44 years old) and also when he repeated the experience four years later in France (48) with worse results. José Antonio Camacho also directed La Roja in Korea and Japan 2002 at a younger age (47) and Fernando Hierro (50) took over Spain’s technical direction as best he could after Julen Lopetegui’s sudden resignation ahead of the 2018 World Cup in Russia.
On the other side are the two most successful coaches in Spain’s history. A clear sign that experience is a diploma was offered by Vicente del Bosque, who was 59 years old when he led the team to the only star in a World Cup and was worse off in Brazil four years later, already at 63 years old age, and Luis Aragonés in Germany 2006, aged 67 in the run-up to the Eurocup in Austria and Switzerland 2008 who restored self-esteem to Spanish football.
The future is guaranteed for Spain. At least according to the awards. Between Pedri and Gavi, they monopolize the awards for the best young footballers of the past two years. The canary won the 2021 Kopa Trophy, a recognition linked to the Ballon d’Or and awarded by the French newspaper ‘L’Equipe’ to the best football player under 21 years old, and also the Golden Boy, the equivalent awarded by the Italian newspaper ‘Tuttosport’. In 2022, Gavi has followed in the footsteps of his team-mate and the national team, with yet another historic doppelgänger elevating the work of Spain’s youth team to the altars. As if that wasn’t enough, in 2020 another Barca prospect, Ansu Fati, was left at the gates of the Golden Boy captured by Norwegian striker Erling Haaland.
Quini and Asensi entered the 1978 World Cup at exactly the same age (both born on September 23, 1949). They were 28 years and 251 days old on the day the tournament started. In this World Cup in Qatar comes the closest between two of the new generation’s prospects, as Villarreal winger Yéremy Pino, who usually plays on the right, was born on October 20, 2002 in Las Palmas de Gran Canaria. Eleven days later, on October 31, 2002, Ansu Fati, also a winger but from Barça, was born in Bissau, more accustomed to playing on the left. Carlos Soler and Pau Torres are also very similar in age, as the former was born on January 2, 1997, and the latter a fortnight later, on January 16 of the same year.
Source: La Verdad
I am Shawn Partain, a journalist and content creator working for the Today Times Live. I specialize in sports journalism, writing articles that cover major sporting events and news stories. With a passion for storytelling and an eye for detail, I strive to be accurate and insightful in my work.
