Article by Stephen Lars
The Spanish National team, the current World Cup Champions, and the EURO 2008 defending champions, began its qualifying run for EURO 2012 with a 4-0 win against Liechtenstein.
This is Spain’s first official game since the team won they World Cup in South Africa. David Villa, the talented striker has now made it into the Spanish soccer history books as he has scored his 44th goal while wearing the national team’s shirt. This has him match the same mark that Raul Gonzalez had achieved with the Red Fury.
Because of its good performance and the strength they gather as a team, the Spanish national team has deserved the respect of soccer fans from around the globe and has for its first time made it into the top of international soccer. The Spanish superiority in regards to the Liechtenstein national team, forced the home team to play under the Spanish terms and conditions.
Despite the very talented squad, head coach Vicente Del Bosque kept a good grip of his team. He came up with a very solid and well-balanced team that included striker Fernando Torres and defender Carlos Marchena who started in exchange of Carles Puyol who is currently recovering from an injury.
Spain was very dominant from the start. The team moved its lines forward and gave much work to the home team’s defense. After only 19 minutes of game time the Spaniards were able to score their first goal.
Fernando Torres would be the man in charge of the opening goal. Despite playing a very under par World Cup, Fernando Torres is proving that he only had a bad month, and it has nothing to do with his overall performance.
After the first opening goal, the game was mostly played over in the Liechtenstein own half of the court. The Spanish strikers were giving the local goalkeeper Peter Jehle much work, with many offensive shots on goal. Very little were the local players able to shot at the Spaniard keeper Iker Casillas. He only had to face a one on one situation during the whole 90 minutes of play.
Spain took advantage of the very inefficient game plan of the home team to bring in the second goal. 27 minutes into the game David Villa, took one heck of a shot from 25 meters away that was a bit too much for keeper Jehle to contain. It was a great goal.
Towards the end of the first half, the Spaniards keep moving their offensive lines forward, trying to create plays that would give them more chances to score. Torres, as well as Andres Iniesta and Xavi Hernandez took the spotlight as they kept taking shots at goal. Had it not been for the effort and agility of the local keeper Jehle, the Spaniards would have scored a couple more goals.
At the beginning of the second half, it was Martin Frick, perhaps the better-known player from Liechtenstein who could have scored for his team. Despite taking a good shot, Iker Casillas had a good position and he was able to keep the ball under control.
The local team was unable to fully react to the Spaniards first goals, and giving how the game was been played, there were little chances for them. To make things even worse for the locals, again Torres came in after some 10 minutes of play in the second half to score the third goal for the Spaniards.
After 57 minutes, Del Bosque changed Torres for David Silva, who without missing a beat came in to score the fourth goal for Spain 5 minutes after he came in the game.
Spain will now face Lithuania for the EURO 2012 qualifying stage on October 8th.
About the Author
Stephen Lars has been a prominent writer on regular International Football games, sports news and the sportsbetting industry for many exceptional sports web sites. You may reprint this article in its full content, please note no modifications to it are accepted.