FRANCE 98 – Team Detail

Spain join Brazil, Argentina and Germany as one of the few countries making their six consecutive appearance in the World Cup finals.

However, their record in the finals leaves a lot to be desired, with the most notable failure coming in 1982, when they failed to get beyond the second round on home soil.

It’s a different story at club level. Real Madrid, with six European Champions Cups (1956,’57,’58,’59,’60,’66) to their name and Barcelona, who won the Champions Cup in 1992) and have four Cup Winners’ Cups to their name (1979,’82,’89,’97), are two of the biggest names in world football. In the 1950s and ’60s. Players like Alfredo Di Stefano (Real Madrid 1953-64), Ferenc Puskas (Real Madrid 1958-1969), Francisco Gento (Real Madrid 1953-71) and Luis Suarez (Barcelona and Inter Milan) earned the status of legends of the game.

The national team failed to feed off this success. One European Championship win (they beat Russia 2-1 in Madrid in the 1964), one runners-up appearance in the same event in 1984, when they lost 2-0 to France in the final, and fourth place in the 1994 World Cup in the USA is all they have to show for their efforts.

In recent years Basque coach Javier Clemente has brought renewed hope to Spanish fans. Since his arrival in 1992, Spain have lost only three times in 54 matches (33 wins, 18 draws). Unfortunately one of these defeats came in the quarter-finals of USA 94 to Italy.

Players like Kiko, Abelardo and Ferrer, who helped Spain win Olympic gold in Barcelona 1992, now form the backbone of the side, while 36-year-old goalkeeper Andoni Zubizarreta has seen it all — this will be his fourth consecutive World Cup. Their potential star player in France, however, is Raul, the 20-year-old forward who has already passed the 50-goal mark for Real Madrid.