EAST RUTHERFORD, N.J. — Sunday evening in New Jersey became a celestial event for Spain as they added a second star to their crimson shirts, but the 48 hours before the FIFA World Cup final were full of “there’s something in the air” moments for La Roja.
It started in Midtown Manhattan on Friday afternoon, when Spain captain Rodri stared out the window of the massive building where both teams were holding their prematch news conferences. We’d informed him that this point of the mighty Hudson River was a couple of hundred meters from where US Airways Flight 1549 was landed by its captain Chesley “Sully” Sullenberger after a bird strike resulted in a double engine failure (all crew and passengers were saved).
Room 504 in the Javits Center has 70-foot-tall floor-to-ceiling windows overlooking the stretch of water that separates the most-sought-after properties in the world from New Jersey, and Rodri just stood there gazing in awe, wondering, aloud, how the hell it was that, in the depths of winter, no one had perished.
After that, he conducted our interview with all his natural clarity, articulacy and intensity of communication — it was a treat. But he was returning to base, in Montclair, New Jersey, by road — albeit with a police cavalcade escort. The coach? He was taking to the air in his own fashion.
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Having been fêted by Novak Djokovic and Kevin Hart, then greeted warmly by Lionel Messi, Luis de la Fuente and two of his closest staff, including director of football and UEFA Champions League winner with Real Madrid Aitor Karanka, hit the helipad and flew over to Newark en route to their temporary HQ. De la Fuente loved the experience, gazed with the same awe as Rodri had at the Hudson in all its glory (Thursday had seen New York shrouded in the smoke caused by those awful wildfires in Canada, but Friday was bright and shiny and blue) before passing MetLife Stadium where, two days later, he knew his opportunity to mount the all-time podium would come to pass.
A neat little moment followed when, as the Spain staff departed the chopper and trotted across the apron to the door of the private terminal, there was one of the all-time great athletes, waiting there for them.
Tom Brady had been on an earlier flight but hung around wanting to say something to De la Fuente. That something was: “Good luck, man. Go f— them up!” Brady was always adept with a pass, and it was Spain he’d chosen to pass on his support.
Saturday was a different story. The same heavens that would drop a star on them by Sunday, to which De la Fuente regularly gives thanks (he’s religious and a firm believer) sent down some of the wildest elemental forces — something that did a good job of screwing up Spain’s plans.
Everyone set off from outside the crowded Bloomfield Street where their hotel is situated. There were screams, hollers, petitions for autographs, cries of “Viva España,” cop cars — the usual. A bit gray overhead, but fine. By the time we all reached the Red Bull New York training facility about 20 minutes away in East Hanover, the atmosphere was heavy, leaden with the threat of rain — but with worse lurking up there.
Just as the world’s media were let into the pitches, setting up behind metal railings, the local security came running out and, with real forcefulness and increasing fury, ordered all of them back out and into the building that had acted as a holding pen for the, literally, hundreds of writers, photographers and broadcasters who’d turned up to report on the champions-elect. One particularly bullish guy, with best intents, literally could not understand why people weren’t sprinting for safety because the news he brought was that thunder and lightning were minutes away, and an established U.S. protocol was being enacted. It was something that was alien to the vast majority of the media there — and to the Spain staff.
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Initially there was a standoff. Media trotted away but Spain’s players and staff wanted to train — the idea that they weren’t going to be allowed to was anathema to them. Eventually, being decent folk all of them, they bent to the will of Red Bull’s security staff and local cops.
But, players being players, there was a growing mutiny. These guys, no matter young or mature, had worked their entire careers for an opportunity like this — to become world champions — so you can understand their focus being on getting the work under their belts. Training, since Chattanooga back on June 5, had been the spinach to their Popeye. They’d worked with increasing rhythm and tempo and intensity and confidence — could you blame them for missing the significance of the weather warnings and wanting to get on with the morning session?
While we sheltered in a room into which rainwater was streaming because of a leak in the roof, some of De la Fuente’s lads rumbled forward into the tunnel that takes you from the locker rooms out onto the field … only for two big, blasting bolts of lightning to smash down in front of them, causing a turn of pace that was only occasionally shown the next night at MetLife Stadium.
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No one had any doubts by then. Training abandoned.
They’d spend the rest of the day in a couple of ways. Packed into the third-floor hotel suite, which had been converted into a hairdresser facility so that they could get their manes — and facial hair — just the way they wanted for the big night, the TV was on, and about a dozen of them watched that mad, Harlem Globetrotters-like third-place match between England and France. And, later, as your author had a couple of pints of Guinness with his brilliant Australian cameraman, the rooftop bar was packed with a dozen or so of the future world champions with friends, parents, grandparents and partners. The players were not drinking alcohol, but the atmosphere was convivial, noisy, happy — not a hint of a nerve anywhere. The perfect preparation.
And then, after the inferno of Argentina‘s anti-soccer nonsense, and postmatch churlishness, the same kind of “this is what we do” atmosphere that I saw when I was in the winning dressing room at the 2010 World Cup and Euro 2012. Tears and joy at first, fine, but then a nonchalance, a degree of: This is for our families, this is what we came here to do. Quick to assume that two-star Spain is the new normal. On the pitch, I interviewed Ferran Torres about his goal and he told me, “I didn’t really think about it, I just hit it with all the power of the Spanish people.”
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He, Marcos Llorente and Marc Pubill had been “the sunshine boys.” Up at dawn to see the sunrise, no matter the city — Chattanooga, Atlanta, Guadalajara, Dallas, Los Angeles or Montclair — stripping off to soak up the sun’s rays at every possible opportunity. Then his moment came and, like Cesc Fabregas coming off the bench in 2010 (having not played anywhere near as much as he’d have desired, providing the winning assist for Andres Iniesta), Ferran was ready.
Pedri did his tongue-out celebration when he saw me near the center circle. Gavi showed me his medal. The team doctor, who I’ve known for 18 years now, embraced me and we both leaked around the eyes. Then big, brilliant, lovable Borja Iglesias grabbed me, jumped up and down and said, “Graham, you’re Spanish, you’ve got two stars … you’re the ‘p— amo‘ [f—ing boss]!”
Then it was off to Newark again, up, up in the air, toward the stars they once coveted but now have a pair, and into the absolute joyous mayhem of Madrid lining the streets to party with them. Campeones del mundo, yes, but fun guys, interesting, dedicated, intense, funny people. Living with them, however briefly, has been the privilege of my working life.
