I hadn't really taken sufficient note of the fear the Spanish team, and all their followers, seem to carry arising from their long history of under performance in tournaments before reading some of the posts and comments on Minus the Shooting. It is perhaps this fear and its effect that results in a team that ought to be forward-looking and hopeful culminating in the curiously unsastisfactory experience of watching them. I know I should like them, but there's just something wrong with them.
There are many excellent analyses of this fear, and its possible cause/effect, by contributors there which I won't be able to improve on. Zeno makes the excellent comment that Spain needed to prosper without sacrificing their principles and identity (expressed primarily in their tiki-taka style) to fully exorcise such fears/ghosts. This resulted in them dogmatically sticking with their chosen style of play (and perhaps even prohibited them from adequately addressing any flaws it may have?), contributing greatly to the wrought tension that seemed to categorise this tournament.
Part of me completely agrees with this view, and equally admonishes myself for not being generous enough to hold it myself. Seeing the Spanish bench exstatically rush towards Iniesta to celebrate the winning goal, seeing all these unquestionably great players overcome by the joy of their achievement - and I want to begrudge them this? I really need to get out more.
Part of me also thinks however, that their tiki-taka system is inherently fearful. Their emphasis on retention of the ball, while initially seeming like a commendable, positive philosophy, also has an air of desperation. This terrified panic that we must not lose it. Once you lose the ball, control is lost and you suffer at the fates of these cruel gods. 'Look what happened against Switzerland, we gave them one chance and there was no way back.' Even the Spanish diving, which does seem excessive, seems not to be seeking to gain an advantage but to ensure possession isn't lost, desperately hoping to convert a ball-winning tackle into a play stopping foul (Xavi's penalty dive against Holland being excused as a consequence of the high-stakes 'next goal wins' nature of the final.). If you lose it, they will score. Coming from another Catholic country I understand this sort of belief, this fear of things being out of our hands. Being contrary, I instinctively dislike it. Spain are probably never going to be the team for me.
Another part of me however (and perhaps the largest and true 'meat and potatoes' part of me) thinks Fuck that. Really, what exactly do these Spaniards have to be so haunted by. Seeing Casillas collapse to the the ground in a crushing wave of tears (so overcome was he that a team who have seemed to be on an inexorable 1-0 march to victory have won a match they have been favourites for since 2008) like some unforeseen miracle had just occurred, was just uncouth. I understand it's plainly an emotional time for you, but come on, be a fucking man. What if he didn't win (perish the thought)? How could we all carry on knowing of the injustice that a player who has won 4 La Ligas, 3 Spanish Cups, 2 Champions Leagues and a European Championship may not have a World Cup medal to add to the haul. Perhaps we could create a special award for them to prevent this utter collapse of everything we hold to be right and proper.
I'm sure this seems like bitterness and maybe even that I'm the one lacking perspective, but I can't shake the wrongness of granting their (actually passably successful) history with such gravity. They're not haunted, they're just desperate for success.
If we want to see a true haunting, it's far more evident in someone like Gascoigne. Here is a man so beset by ghosts he seems to embody the experience - the dramatic weight-loss, the incessant shaking, the shock of white hair - that's a haunting, and it's terrible to see. These ghosts are actual, they result from things done, mistakes, crimes, failures, none of which can be (or perhaps feel like they can be) erased or excused by a future action. Gazza is his ghosts, his present a detailed map of all his past wrongs, a living acknowledgement of actions and times we can all pleasantly go on to forget (at least the bits we want to forget). There are no World Cups left for him to address his problems, or at least how he sees his problems, and redemption is forever stuck agonisingly close - a missed penalty, an outstretched leg - leaving him with nothing to do , no point to be made.
At one stage during the final, as another minor scuffle or dive or assault or whatever broke out, Mark Lawrenson said, surprisingly forcefully, 'some of these players really need to grow up'. This will be my abiding opinion of the tournament I feel, football as a product of a system wildly out of control, something I really don't wan't to be part of anymore (in whatever way a spectator is 'part' of it) and so awfully, awfully tedious.
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