At first glance, Luis de la Fuente could easily be mistaken for a college professor – calm, measured, and erudite, hardly the kind of person who intimidates his pupils. Yet the 65-year-old grew up in an era when Spanish football was decided by who survived a tackle, not who passed it. As a left-back for Athletic Club, he made 196 appearances in the 1980s and early 1990s and was on the field the day Andoni Goikoetxea lost. diego maradonaAnkle in the infamous “Butcher of Bilbao” match.
Four decades later, de la Fuente created Spain’s calmest and most complete side. He conceded only one goal in the entire match world cup, The lowest ever by a male champion, and reclaimed football’s biggest prize by playing with remarkable clarity rather than chaos. But this was not some golden generation that just arrived at their doorstep. He made it his own, guiding players from Spain’s under-19, under-21 and Olympic teams before transitioning to the senior team, reflecting his own footballing ideals. And while comparisons with the 2010 World Cup-winning team were inevitable, de la Fuente resisted the temptation to recreate tiki-taka. Instead, he modernized it.
What made Spain the toughest team?
Euro 2024 was about breaking old stereotypes. De la Fuente inherited a side that often suffocated with sterile possession. His biggest change was getting the ball into space faster Lamin Yamal and Nico Williams, trusting him to take on defenders one-on-one. The gamble paid off as Spain repeatedly scored through wide combinations and found decisive contributions from players coming off the bench.
At the World Cup, he further refined that blueprint.
Spain often switched to a 2-3-5 shape in possession. The central midfielders dropped deeper during the build-up, often positioning themselves closer to the centre-backs than Dani Olmo, who worked between the lines. The formation caught opponents out of shape before a quick switch of play through the full-backs, giving Spain’s compact front five space to roam through the central pocket. It was a slow-paced, very hard-pressing development of Spain’s traditional possession game, which made them almost impossible to disrupt.
Every knockout demanded a different Spain
Spain did not rely on one system to defeat every opponent. If anything, their knockout run showed a team capable of adapting without compromising its identity. Against each heavyweight, de la Fuente devised a tailored plan, and the Spaniard executed it with ruthless precision.
In the Round of 16 against Portugal, both sides lined up in a 4-2-3-1 and largely canceled each other out for long periods. De la Fuente’s subtle adjustment was to push Pedri up from the double pivot once Spain settled into Portugal’s half. Rodri remained alone at the base of the midfield, setting the tempo and screening the changes. This effectively gave Spain an extra attacker between the lines without sacrificing defensive balance.
At the back, 19-year-old Pau Quibarsi was tasked with overseeing Cristiano Ronaldo. He did this brilliantly, denying the Portuguese captain any meaningful influence in dangerous areas.
The semi-final against France, billed as ‘best attack versus best defence’, was decided in midfield. Rodri was at the center of everything. Each French attack ultimately resulted in a 2024 Ballon d’Or winner. Whether intercepting passes, breaking up plays or calmly winning possession, Rodri set the tone for the contest. Along with Fabian Ruiz and Dani Olmo, he completely controlled the central part of the park, starving France of territory and time.
France’s midfield soon ran out of solutions as Spain constantly outpaced them, pressing from every angle and preventing clear progress through the thirds. Kylian Mbappe and Ousmane Dembele were left isolated, while the eventual Golden Boot winner failed to register a single shot on target.
Spain defeated France 22–14, winning 14 of France’s eight tackles and claiming 55.9 percent of all duels, France’s worst duel winning percentage in a World Cup match in almost five decades.
A similar blueprint demolished Argentina in the final.
Spain cuts off Lionel Messi’s supply line. The Argentina captain, who entered the final with eight goals and four assists, spent much of the evening wandering around looking for possession. Spain controlled 60 percent of the ball, completing 774 of their 896 passes and limiting Argentina to just two attempts after the 118th minute, neither of which tested Unai Simon.
When the balance was further tipped by Enzo Fernandez’s dismissal, Spain calmly held their own before substitutes Williams and Ferran Torres combined for the decisive breakthrough in extra time.
spain’s silent warrior
Most of the spotlight focused on Rodri and Spain’s midfield, but Cubarsi and Aymeric Laporte were every bit as impressive in producing the best defense of the tournament.
The Cuban completed 668 passes throughout the World Cup, second only to Rodri, while Laporte added another 618 passes. It was a remarkable output for a centre-back duo built around a 19-year-old and an experienced player who had spent the previous two seasons rebuilding their careers away from Europe’s elite.
Kubarsi declared himself one of the breakout stars of the tournament. He replaced Cristiano Ronaldo in a brilliant performance against Portugal, made 10 defensive interventions against France and followed it up with another composed performance in the final against Argentina. He was eligible to receive the Young Player of the Tournament award.
Either side of them, Mark Cucurella and Pedro Porro provided the width that made Spain’s system tick.
With the front five remaining narrow, both full-backs constantly moved up the pitch, overlapping in advanced areas and arriving as extra men in the final third. Poro’s adventurous positioning led to important goals against Austria and France, while Cucurella repeatedly combined with Mikel Oyarzabal on the left and provided two assists during the knockout rounds.
However, outside of possession, they were just as important. Both closed down wide areas at astonishing pace, ensuring that Spain’s centre-backs were rarely dragged into uncomfortable situations.
Putting pressure on him turned mistakes into opportunities
If Spain were patient with the ball, they were completely relentless without it. No team gained possession more often in the attacking third than La Roja. Spain recovered the ball inside the opponent’s half almost nine times per game, second only to Germany in the entire tournament, while it took an average of just 11.6 seconds to win back possession after losing it, the fastest recovery time among all the semi-finalists.
The opponents were forced to make repeated mistakes in areas where three or four Spanish shirts were already waiting.
That relentless pressure translated directly into opportunities. In the final alone, Spain gained possession inside Argentina’s half 28 times, a figure that led to 10 direct attempts at goal.
Rodri and Olmo: Spain’s control tower
Rodri arrived at the World Cup after two injury-plagued seasons with Manchester City, yet he looked every bit the player to win the Ballon d’Or in 2024.
He completed 790 passes during the tournament and overtook Xavi’s record in Spain’s 2010 victorious campaign, while also leading his team in touches, progressive carries and successful tackles.
Olmo, on the other hand, prevented the opponents from advancing. Operating between the lines, he constantly pulled the midfielders and centre-backs out of position, creating spaces that others could exploit. His movement proved decisive against France, with Pedro Porro repeatedly drawing Maxence Lacroix and Dayot Upamecano away from the defensive line before slotting into the empty channel to score.
Rodri and Olmo combined to give Spain complete command of every phase of the game, one controlling possession, the other dismantling the opposition structure.
The Reinvention of Mikel Oyarzabal
Oyarzabal never looked like a traditional number 9. For most of his career, he operated as a winger before re-establishing himself as a striker after recovering from a serious ACL injury that sidelined him for almost a year in 2022. This change had great results at this World Cup, where he finished as Spain’s leading scorer with nine goals.
Unlike many modern forwards, Oyarzabal constantly moved into midfield, linking up the play, creating space for Williams and Yamal to attack from wide positions, and then making his runs into the box with remarkable intelligence. Their movement provided unpredictability to the Spanish attack.
Against France, it was his clever positioning that repeatedly pulled the centre-backs out of shape, opening up lanes for Porro to score. In the final, he again sacrificed individual glory, stringing together strikes from deep before Williams took possession for Torres’s extra-time winner.
He finished the tournament as Spain’s top scorer, yet his greatest contribution was making everyone around him better.
Put everything together and Spain fielded the most complete team at the World Cup. Victory occurred only because each player understood his role.
