Luis De la Fuente, what a great marquis you are going to be. And how far will you go? It’s 2010 again. A Barcelona striker who gives us the cup and Mourinho landing in Madrid. The balance. Neither Mou is that Mou nor Ferrán is that Iniesta. But we are the same: a euphoric, proud, optimistic country that overcomes evil in all its forms. That of the abertzales who attack entire families in Bilbao and three hours later have to swallow a World Cup shouted at a pass from Nico Williams. That of the cancheritos, put in their place because they never aspired to be anything else. What a scandal and what a pleasure to see you, Paredes, still on the field at minute 125 to fully savor the defeat, without the excuse of having gone to the shower like your teammate Enzo.
Evil in the form of our distrust, too. We were afraid that everything would go as planned. That we would have no rival throughout the final. We were afraid that the only football would be ours, the only bravery ours, the only drive ours, the only kindness ours. And that in the end it would all be the same. With every minute, schizophrenia made its way: What if the plan wasn’t good? What if the ideal scenario isn’t enough? And the worst question: what if the players chicken out like me? What if a final in which Messi doesn’t appear is like a 100-minute horror movie in which, after 99, you still haven’t gotten scared?
Sometimes it happens that life is not such a big deal. That fear reaches only as far as one wants. That there are movies that don’t scare just as there are teams that don’t propose, that exist only as far as they are allowed. And when they are not allowed, they don’t exist. That things happen as they have to happen and we, our jinx, our superstition, mean nothing. Nor theirs. That everything is painted by Luis De la Fuente, who doesn’t feel our fear, who always ignores the changes we ask for, but who always gets it right.
What comes next? A World Cup at home in four years, thanks to Morocco. The back-to-back championship, the third star. The country that has exported all the successful forms of football that triumph today winning at home. The marquis of the partnership expanding the legend of a team that knows how to dominate international football as if it were a club that trains from July to June. If they are not afraid, why should we be.
