Day 22, World Cup 2010: “Cesc’s pretty pissed off with me”

Running right alongside Brazil 2014, this is my day-by-day story of how Spain won the last World Cup. You can catch up on previous posts.

These stories are from Spain: The Inside Story of La Roja’s Historic Treble, by Graham Hunter

Ellis Park is dilapidated in places. Inside the stadium, where I meet Del Bosque as he waits to go into the press conference, there is a part of the access tunnel where wires hang down, a bit of hardboard covers a gaping hole and the lights do not function fully. The Mister and I have finished our brief interview in a nicely lit and furnished television studio. He and I lean against the corridor wall and chat while we wait for what transpires to be a long Cesc Fabregas and Gerard Piqué press conference to finish.

The coach tells me: “Cesc’s pretty pissed off with me. And he’s got every right to be, too.” Del Bosque goes on to emphasise the importance of having a mix of young bucks and experience on the bench. Each of them, for slightly different reasons, stays ready for the chance to come on and play well enough to grab a start the next time.

Del Bosque surprises me a little by quizzing me about what the apartheid regime was like – growing up under Franco, Spain was not the place to be for freedom of debate and information, or liberal points of view. Slightly startled at having been put on the spot, I refer to what various South African friends have told me about their lives before and after apartheid.

In due course, while we mark time, I get my customary urge to bring all football chat back to 1983, the year my team, Aberdeen, beat Del Bosque’s Real Madrid to win the European Cup Winners’ Cup in Gothenburg. I ask the Spain coach where he was on May 11 that year.

He does not know. He is highly amused to be told that I do. He’d just failed to make Alfredo di Stefano’s squad for the final in which Aberdeen added to Madrid’s miserable season, when they lost five trophies either in finals or on the last day of the season.

“How many of my team can you name?” he challenges me.

By the time I have rattled out seven names, the doors of the press conference hall are opening and Fabregas and Piqué are emerging. “Here, you two,” shouts Del Bosque. “Come and speak to someone who knows something about football.” It’s not the worst moment of my World Cup.

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