Spanish National Football Team Fandom

The Championship becomes something you either believe in or you don't, like God. You concede that it's possible, of course, and you try to respect the views of those who have managed to remain credulous... but in my heart of hearts I knew that it would never happen, just as I knew that they were not, as I used to think when I was young, going to find a cure for death before I got old.

-Nick Hornby

In our world, death is inevitable. Except when you decide it's not. It took me 14 years to apply this perspective to my soccer fanaticism. Like many things that apply to soccer, it applies to real life as well.

This may sound a bit dramatic, but what's soccer without a little drama? The story of my support for the Spanish national team begins and ends, as many stories do, with short gentlemen from Southern Europe sporting bad haircuts.

I played soccer growing up, thanks to my dad's influence. Before 1994, my only exposure to international soccer was watching a few World Cup games on TV with my dad. I also attended an Atletico Madrid game in late 1991, as a curious tourist during my study abroad program. But I was mostly ignorant of the professional game in Europe, Latin America and elsewhere. When the 1994 World Cup arrived, I took it upon myself to learn more about the international game. I was living in Boston at the time, so I bought tickets to the quarterfinal in Foxboro Stadium, not knowing who would show up. I also invited my dad to fly out to Boston for the game, which gave the event a special significance.

As fate would have it, Spain and Italy showed up to play. Roberto Baggio decided the result with a late, late goal in regulation time. Il Codino Divino - the Divine Ponytail - carried the Italian team all the way to the final with seemingly divine moments of inspiration. The Spaniards fought well, and came close to scoring the winning goal earlier in the match, but their moment of salvation never arrived.

My fate as a soccer fan was sealed when the final whistle blew and the Spanish players collapsed on the pitch in their private agonies, defeated by the heat and humidity as much as Baggio's goal. The game made me a fan of the losing team, and not the winning team. I was already predisposed to support Spain. I studied there for six months, I spoke reasonably good Spanish, and I have Spanish blood in me (several generations removed). But these factors alone did not account for my decision. There was something more to it.

Over the next few years, I learned that Spain had a peculiar tradition of losing at the quarterfinal stage or earlier of major tournaments, in spite of their considerable talent developed at world-class club teams. Over the next 12 years, I saw for myself Spain's expert ability to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory:

• Euro 96 Qualify from the group stage, lose the quarterfinal to England in a penalty shootout. A tough blow given England's notorious inability to win penalty shootouts against anybody else.
• World Cup 98 A surprise defeat to Nigeria and an ugly draw with Paraguay leaves Spain needing Paraguay to lose the final group game. Doesn't happen, of course.
• Euro 2000 Defeat to Norway in the first group game leaves Spain needing a victory against Yugoslavia. In a wild shootout, Spain win 4-3 with a last-minute desperation goal. They proceed to lose the quarterfinal to France, the eventual champions, with Raul missing a last-minute, potentially game-tying penalty in regular time.
• World Cup 2002 Easy qualification from the group stage. Nail-biting shootout win over Ireland in the Round of 16, while other world powers like France, Portugal, Argentina and Italy exit early. Could this be the year? Of course not. Spain loses to South Korea in the quarterfinal penalty shootout, helped by the annulment of two legitimate Spanish goals by the officiating crew.
• Euro 2004 Needing a tie against Portugal in the final group game to advance, they proceed to lose by one goal.
• World Cup 2006 Again, easy qualification from the group stage, winning big and with style. The first real challenge comes from France, who once again send Spain home.

In spite of these setbacks, my support never wavered. In fact, I often felt stronger emotions for Spain than for the national teams of the United States or Ecuador (my father's homeland). I attributed my passion to several factors:

• The Spanish teams usually played open, attacking soccer, and always featured several creative players of great technical ability.
• They did not play smothering, win-at-all costs defense, which made their games generally more attractive to watch for neutrals as well as partisans.
• They always qualified for the tournaments themselves, even when faced with do-or-die situations.
• They played the game in a reasonably fair spirit, without the diving, whining, or consistent hard fouling of other national teams to remain nameless.
• In spite of their talent, they always maintained an underdog status compared to the other top soccer teams of the world.

Perhaps most importantly, it was a team that I could call my own. Spain does not have a great bandwagon appeal in the United States, even among fellow soccer fanatics. I found myself quite alone in my support for Spain among soccer-loving friends and family members, which I did not mind one bit. Even many of the Spaniards I met were surprised by my enthusiasm for their national team, which sometimes exceeded their own. Watching a friendly against Italy in a bar with several Spaniards, I happily showed off a patch of a Spanish crest that I received as a gift. My lucky charm, I explained. The Spaniards weren't sure what to do with me after that, so they mostly kept to themselves. Slightly embarrassed, I retired the patch to a hidden corner of my apartment.

I approached Euro 2008 with the same mixture of anticipation and dread as previous tournaments. Spain overcame a few unexpected losses to qualify, with a talented team frequently mentioned as a dark horse for winning the championship. Their midfield was strong on attacking midfielders with great technique and passing skills. Villa and Torres were a top-notch strike duo, and in Iker Casillas they had possibly the best goalkeeper of the tournament. On the other hand, the defense was rated average at best, and the substitutes for the strikers were not tested in international competitions.

Once again, the Spaniards breezed through the group stage with generally solid, occasionally inspired play. Their reward was a date with Italy in the quarterfinal. Here we go again, I said to myself. Another opportunity for Spain to find a way to lose, by any means necessary.

Spain duly outplayed Italy over 120 minutes, without getting the goal that their attacking skills deserved. However, Casillas and the weakest-link defense held firm, sending the game to penalties. A cruel way for Spain to lose, of course, but not unprecedented. Everything was going according to plan.

What happened next was not impossible. But it was unbelievable.

Casillas, the spiky-haired Madrileño, saved two penalties. Cesc Fabregas, the spiky-haired Catalan, put away the final penalty with the game on the line. Spain advanced to the semifinal.

The Gods of Soccer, it seemed, had looked the other way this time.

I was very happy, of course, but also very confused. I later realized that my expectation for defeat had reached a frightening level of inevitability, equivalent perhaps to death and taxes. Once I was relieved of this burden of expectation, I felt better, but in a light-headed kind of way. It can take some time to understand how free you are once a burden has been lifted.

For the semifinal and the final, I learned to support my team with a newfound freedom. Sure, they might lose and be branded as failures once again by the international media. But for me, they were winners no matter what happened. They had overcome the death and taxes barrier that seemed impossible to surmount, at least in my own mind and the minds of millions of soccer fans around the world.

I reveled in supporting a winning Spain, with more confidence and joy to offset the lingering anxieties. Casillas, Fabregas, Xavi, Torres, and the other spiky-haired gentlemen did not let me down. Spain won the championship, and deservedly so. They won it in style, with excellent attacking play and an effective but not brutal defense. They won by beating the difficult teams with winning mentalities and traditions, like Italy and Germany, that had thwarted them so often in the past.

Perhaps most importantly, they achieved victory without defeating themselves. The internal rivalries common in past teams, and in the nation as a whole, did not appear. They won with a cross-section of players from across the various, fractious regions, working together for the good of the team and the country. In Marcos Senna, a holding midfielder and star performer, the team featured a naturalized immigrant, the kind easily found on the streets of this newly prosperous country. The Spain of darkness as portrayed by commentators reflecting on the nation's turbulent history – was replaced by a Spain of light.

In the days after, I wondered once again why I supported Spain with such fervor in the first place. In the past, my favorite answer was the urge to support the underdog, as I tend to do in most soccer games. This time, I had a different answer. To some degree, my perception of the Spanish national team matched my perception of my own life. I saw myself as a talented underdog, faced with challenges more internal than external. I had achieved a series of minor successes, surviving and advancing through the qualifying tournaments of life, but with few championship-caliber moments to celebrate. I found moments of creativity and inspiration to win small battles here and there, but lacking in strength and force of will to win the war. I believed in a fate that fell short of ultimate victory.

The analogy is a bit of a stretch. Melodramatic, perhaps, and definitely narcissistic. But also very true. I saw in Spain what I saw in myself. I developed a pattern of behavior for supporting the team that had less to do with the team itself than with my own personal emotions and expectations. The key moments in the team's performance over the years, for better or worse, merely reinforced this pattern.

With one penalty kick, the pattern was broken.

Has my life changed immediately and completely as a result? No, of course not. But I now recognize the need to change my expectations for my own life, little by little, step by step. The first step is to change my attitude as a supporter of Spain. The team will win and lose games, and tournaments, and I will continue to watch them play at every opportunity. But their performance, and my support, will not be guided by a cruel fate imposed by the Gods of Soccer, or by my own will. It's time for me to relax and enjoy the games they play without the fear of death hanging overhead.

The next steps will be more difficult, but not impossible. Because defeat is not inevitable in soccer. Nor should it be in life.

A Beggar for Good Soccer is a column by Marcelo Guevara and will be appearing whenever he finds enough inspiration from the beautiful game.