Football lesson in Dallas. Unexpected because it was given by Spain over France and not the other way around, when the team that had been suffering through the matches was the red one and the one that was getting through them without barely a fuss was the blue one. The monumental display (we are not exaggerating, the importance of the event,…
There will be no fifth World Cup final for France, after having been in the last two consecutively (Russia 2018, Qatar 2022). The first team in the FIFA ranking, the one that had displayed the best play in the tournament in the USA, Mexico, and Canada, was a caricature in the hands of Spain. The Bleus never performed at the level they had shown, not even close, defeated in all lines by De la Fuente’s players.
For the second time in its history, Spain will play the World Cup final after defeating France 2-0 with goals from Mikel Oyarzabal and Pedro Porro, in a match with few scoring opportunities in which the Iberian team imposed its dominance. In the final, Spain will face on Sunday the winner of the match to be played on Wednesday between Argentina and England.
The Spanish team is already in the World Cup final after defeating France 0-2 in a highly demanding semifinal. The team led by Luis de la Fuente once again delivered a solid and effective performance to overcome one of the top favorites for the title and come just one match away from winning the championship. After the match, the coach highlighted the pride he feels for his players’ performance, praised the team’s collective level, and called for maintaining unity with the fans ahead of the tournament’s final match.
If the Bourbons will never forget July 14, 1789, the beginning of the end, the blues will also not be able to put aside for long what happened on another July 14, 237 years after the storming of the Bastille. Without needing to behead anyone, applying a plan designed and executed with the precision of a Swiss watch, Spain ruined the neighboring country’s national holiday with a display of competitiveness that took them to the World Cup final. World Cup final, three simple words whose symbolism transcends any dictionary.
The preview of the World Cup semifinal between Spain and France has been surrounded by the last two precedents that favor the Spanish, with special prominence of Lamine Yamal against Kylian Mbappé, but the history of the encounters between La Roja and the Bleus goes much further back with more encouraging chapters for the French.
Reviewing the biography of Didier Deschamps (Bayonne, 1968) it is striking that he has not even turned 60. The French coach seems to have spent his whole life on the bench of les bleus, but when the World Cup ends in a few days and he concludes his successful 14-year tenure leading his country, he will still have much to live for. “The French national team is the best thing that has ever happened to me,” he repeats with that inscrutable expression, halfway between a smile and a grimace. Surely, as the facts confirm, Deschamps is also the best thing that has ever happened to the French national team.
Sea or mountain. Cold or heat. Order or chaos. Lamine Yamal or Mbappé. Spain or France. To each their own. What is certain is that the first World Cup semifinal confirms a new rivalry, a classic of modern football, a clash between what are surely the two most powerful national teams in the world, if Messi allows it. In Dallas, both sides of the Pyrenees face off in a semifinal of a major tournament for the third consecutive time. In the previous two, Euro 2024 and the 2025 Nations League, De la Fuente and his boys were sharper and made it to the final. But the past will be of little use when the ball starts rolling on the green of the AT&T Stadium, well covered, avoiding the scorching heat that reigns in the state of Texas these days.
Just turned 19, Lamine Yamal appeared before the media ahead of the World Cup semifinal between France and Spain in Dallas, and before addressing the match, he made his position clear regarding the controversy sparked by Mariano Rajoy about the French internationals.
It has been more than twenty years since England and Argentina have played on the same field. It has been 7,914 days since they last faced each other, on November 11, 2005. It is normal that Leo Messi has never faced the English, but Ayala, Samuel, and Aimar, three members of Lionel Scaloni’s coaching staff, have.