MADRID, June 2 (Reuters) - Spain have spent the last two years making international football look like a problem someone else has to solve and as the World Cup looms the question for the other 47 teams is blunt enough -- who can stop Luis de la Fuente's red machine?
The European champions arrive at the tournament with a record fourth continental title behind them, a dazzling collective identity and the air of a side who have discovered the rarest of tournament ingredients -- style with steel.
Their Euro 2024 triumph in Germany was not built on one irresistible individual but on a swarm of them.
Spain won every match, played fast, direct, fearless football and repeatedly found answers from the bench when matches began asking awkward questions.
The final against England told the story neatly.
Substitute Mikel Oyarzabal became the 10th Spain player to score at Euro 2024 when he helped to craft and then finished the 86th-minute goal that sealed a 2-1 win. It was Spain's 15th goal of the tournament, the most by any team at a Euros.
At the centre of it all is De la Fuente, once mocked online as "Luis de la Who?" after his appointment in 2023 following more than a decade working in Spain's youth system.
Nearly four years later, the joke has aged about as well as a banana left in a gym bag.
De la Fuente's strength is that this group has not been hastily assembled. He has worked before with many of the players travelling to North America, including Rodri, Mikel Merino and Fabian Ruiz, who were part of his success with the Under-19 and Under-21 sides.
Nobody, though, has flourished more spectacularly than Lamine Yamal. The Barcelona winger exploded into global view as a 16-year-old and was an integral part of the Euro 2024 triumph.
That launched him into a remarkable 2024-25 season, when he helped Barca to win a LaLiga-Copa del Rey double and finished close to Paris St Germain's Ousmane Dembele in the Ballon d'Or voting.
This season has been less smooth but still successful, as he was Barcelona's MVP in their successful LaLiga title defence.
Now 18, Yamal has dealt with a lingering groin problem and is racing to recover from a serious hamstring injury sustained in late April, leaving Spain anxiously waiting to see whether he will reach the World Cup in peak condition.
De la Fuente has other problems too.
Merino has been sidelined for months with a broken foot, Barca attacking midfielder Fermin Lopez will miss the tournament with a similar fracture and Nico Williams has also struggled with groin and hamstring issues.
Yet Spain's great trick has been continuity through disruption. They keep the same shape, tempo and bite whoever plays, retaining their essence without a traditional number nine and with attacking threats scattered across the pitch.
Their shootout loss to Portugal in last year's Nations League final was a rare sting.
Otherwise, De la Fuente's Spain have rattled through 33 matches with 28 wins, three draws and two defeats.
The World Cup will test whether that rhythm can survive heat, travel, injuries and expectation in Group H against Cape Verde, Saudi Arabia and Uruguay. For now, Spain look less like hopefuls than the team everyone else must chase.
(Reporting by Fernando Kallas; Editing by Ken Ferris)
