La Furia Roja seal their place in the pantheon of greats

"Those people who think we are playing boring football, in my opinion they don't understand the game." said

Cesc Fabregas, after playing a vital role in Spain's crushing defeat of Italy in the Euro 2012 final. The Spanish midfielder who played the role of a false nine, was pivotal in Spain's success, not only yesterday, but throughout the tournament. 

Spain quickly settled into their usual rhythm of El Rondo, dictating the pace of the game early on. Soon enough, after a series of scintillating passes, the first chance came in the form of a Xavi Herdandez shot - just over the bar. After a period of further sustained possession, the breakthrough arrived. Iniesta, the craftsman, fed Fabregas's llegada, a perfectly timed run, who fought off Chiellini to deliver a crisp cross for Silva to hit home. 

Italy responded well after going down with Antonio Cassano's dual attempts thwarted by Iker Casillas. But just before half-time, in another brilliant move down the left, Jordi Alba sped away to collect a sumptuous ball from Xavi to bury it past Buffon with a conventional number 9's calmness. At 2-0, Italy were looking down the barrel. 

Prandelli's half-time substitution, Antonio di Natalie for Cassano, almost paid dividends as he came close to scoring twice. One of which evoked a fine save from Casillas. Italy's third and final substitution, Montolivo off for Motta, turned out to be a slice of misfortune for them. Motta, just four minutes into the game, picked up a hamstring injury which meant Italy had to contain Spain with ten men for over thirty minutes, a task that's difficult even with eleven men on. As the game meandered towards the inevitable, Torres was brought on and soon scored Spain's third - another wonderful assist from Xavi - thus becoming the only player to score in two European Championship finals. Mata came on for the first time in this tournament and collected Spain's final goal, assisted by Chelsea teammate Torres, to seal a thumping win. 

As Iker collected his team's third consecutive major title (with West Germany coming closest to achieving that feat in 1976), one can't help but wonder how allegations such as 'boring' were levied against this Spanish  side. A deluded view held by certain sections of the media who couldn't even dream of their side playing such a brand of football. 

"Spanish football is living great years. We are very complete as a football side and we have to be proud of that." says Iniesta. Twenty years down the line, we will look back at this Spanish era, and we will consider ourselves to be lucky enough to have witnessed this side take the field. Tiki-taka lives on.