And we’re on! The world’s biggest football party starts today, and hundreds of millions of fans all over the world will cheer on their favorite team. Spain is there – of course. This time with Germany, Japan and Costa Rica as its group stage competitors, together denominated Group E. A total of 32 countries are competing for the World Cup title. This time the venue is in Qatar, where human rights issues, along with questions about whether games can be played at all in this kind of desert heat, have almost overshadowed the competition itself. So, unusually, the fight to become the best national team in men’s football is held in November-December rather than in the summer.
Most people know that Spain has club teams that are among the very best in Europe and the world. Players from the two most famous clubs, Real Madrid and Barcelona, have for years formed the backbone of the Spanish national team. This year 10 of the 26 players come from either Real Madrid or Barcelona while another eight play for other teams in La Liga. It may seem strange then that the national team has not done better in international competitions.
You can find the current squad with the clubs they play for and other information here:
Spain has participated in most World Cups since 1920 but has only won it once. That happened in 2010 in South Africa. Until then, the national team could only boast a fourth place, and that was as far back as in 1950. Until the UEFA European Football Championship in 2008, Spain’s national team had only rarely distinguished themselves in the absolute top tier of international football.
Nor has being the host country for major international tournaments helped their performances – quite the opposite actually. When Spain hosted the football World Cup in 1982, Spain was not particularly successful. According to statistics from FIFA, football’s international organization, only two countries have performed worse when hosting rather than playing major tournaments abroad: Brazil and Spain.
Passionate about football throughout Spain
In a 2014 survey, 67% of Spanish respondents say they are interested in football and that they have a favorite club. Three quarters of them report that they watch games with their favorite team as often as possible. Spain has almost a million active footballers (both women and men) and more than 20,000 clubs. The most popular clubs among fans are, unsurprisingly, Real Madrid (followed by almost 40% of respondents), Barcelona (with just over 25%) and Atletico Madrid (16%). Other clubs such as Valencia, Athletic Bilbao and Sevilla are supported by around 3.5% of the population.
The national team, on the other hand, has traditionally not had anywhere near the same support or benefited from the same commitment as the club teams. Quite a few support the national team of course, but Spain also has football enthusiasts who simply hope that the national team does poorly, and others who don’t care if they win or lose. In recent years, however, it seems support for the Spanish national team has grown.
Some have argued that, historically, the rivalry between players from the main opponents Real Madrid and Barcelona must be given much of the blame for the national team’s modest performances. But, with more frequent player and coaching transfers among La Liga clubs in recent years, perhaps this rivalry has become somewhat less sharp on the national level.
In addition, measures have been taken to gather the public around Spain’s national team in different ways than before. For instance, until the qualification for the European Championship in 1996, all international matches in Spain were played in Seville, but from then on, such games are played on pitches scattered throughout the country.
Understand and learn what Spanish commentators say
Want to cheer the Spanish team on in Spanish? Here are some important words and phrases you can use.
Football words and expressions, Part I
Part II
British migrant workers brought football to Spain
The Brits who ensured that football in its modern form came to Spain. It happened towards the end of the 19th century. At the time there were indeed significant colonies of British foreign workers in Spain. Many of them had found work in shipyards or in mines. British sailors were happy to visit compatriots in Spain when they had shore leave, and football was then as now a popular pastime. You can see the British influence on Spanish football in many of the names of Spanish football teams: FC (Fútbol or Football Club), Athletic Club etc.
It didn’t take long for the Spanish locals to take an interest in football. The first official football match in Spain was supposedly played in Seville on March 8, 1890. Whether or not the match has a claim to the title “first official football match on Spanish soil” can perhaps be debated, but the line-up shows how important the British was for the rise of football on the Iberian Peninsula: with the exception of two players on each team, all the participants were British.
Both Catalonia and the Basque Country were areas with many British foreign workers around the year 1900. Catalonia was Spain’s most industrialized region and therefore attracted many job seekers from foreign lands. Barcelona was an early adopter of football, so it is not without reason that local teams are among the very best to this day. Incidentally, the Bilbao football club was founded by British shipyard workers and miners as well as Basque youths who had returned home after studying in Great Britain.
With that said, here at Find Your Spain, we are ready to root for the Spanish team! The first game is Wednesday the 23rd at 5 pm with Costa Rica as the opponent. All the best for the game!
Featured image by Rosy – The world is worth thousands of pictures, Pixabay.
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