SOON after being confirmed as Spain’s permanent national coach, Robert Moreno set an all time record when he picked his team for October’s Euro 2020 qualifer in Norway.
For the first time in 99 years of playing international football, across 699 senior games, Moreno’s line-up had 11 players from 11 different clubs: Chelsea (Kepa Arrizabalaga), Sevilla (Jesus Navas), Villarreal (Raul Albiol), Real Madrid (Sergio Ramos), Paris Saint Germain (Juan Bernat); Napoli (Fabian Ruiz), Barcelona (Sergio Busquets), Atletico Madrid (Saul Niguez); Real Sociedad (Mikel Oyarzabal), Valencia (Rodrigo Moreno) and Arsenal (Dani Ceballos).
This was a startling stat – and a big change from recent years, when players from La Liga’s big two always dominated La Roja squads. Six and then seven Barcelona players featured in the World Cup 2010 and Euro 2012 finals. Then started a shift towards Real Madrid, who had the most players in Julen Lopetegui’s squad at WC 2018 (seven).
Sergio Ramos must not expect to be guaranteed a starting spot for Spain, head coach Robert Moreno has warned pic.twitter.com/oYLzMIgL6U
— Boda Sports (@BodaSports) September 4, 2019
Such dominance is long over. The 23-man squad to face Malta and Romania in the current international break is drawn from a remarkable 17 different clubs. Villarreal have the most players – four in Raul Albiol, Santi Cazorla, Pau Torres, and Gerard Moreno. Madrid have just captain Sergio Ramos and Dani Carvajal, while Barca's sole representative is Sergio Busquets.
This is not necessarily an ideal scenario, Moreno admitted after the 1-1 draw in Norway, presumably knowing that basing an international side around one or two successful club teams has a long history of tournament success (inc Germany 2014 and Italy 2006). “We've many players distributed among many teams,” he said. “I'd like to have seven players from the same team, that they play together each week, but that’s not the case. I didn’t know that statistic, but what it says is that we have many good players at many good teams.”
Spain followed that disappointing result in Norway with another 1-1 in Sweden four days later, which was enough to confirm qualification for next summer’s finals. The quirky stat from that game was that it was the first time in 18 years that none of Spain’s starters from the 2008, 2010 or 2012 finals were in the XI. After back-to-back-to-back disasters at the last three tournaments, first Luis Enrique and more recently Moreno have spread their nets very wide to search for new faces, hungry for success.
Moreno has especially looked to last summer’s Under-21 European champions, with Dani Ceballos, Fabian and Mikel Oyarzabal having made the step up. Some of those involved in that squad were also Euro U-19 winners in 2015. That ‘1996 generation’ includes Rodrigo (Manchester City), Unai Nunez (Athletic Bilbao) and Madrid’s currently injured winger Marco Asensio.
But there are also clear structural reasons for the wide spread. For quite a while now young Spaniards have struggled to become important first team members at the Camp Nou or Bernabeu. Three Madrid players played in the U-21 final win over Germany last summer, but they all then left on loan (Ceballos to Arsenal, Jesus Vallejo to Wolves and Borja Mayoral to Levante). There was only one player from Barca's La Masia academy in the squad, although Dani Olmo had left five years previously for Dinamo Zagreb.
Not sure what to make of the Adama Traore circus.
Agrees to play for Mali.
Days later, gets a Spain call up and accepts.
Now, can't play for Spain due to an injury.
— Gary #JoySports (@garyalsmith) November 10, 2019
Moreno has also clearly decided it is better to pick a player starting regularly for his club. Ceballos was Spain’s best player in the crucial 2-1 win in Romania in September, having left the Bernabeu bench (where Isco still sits) to play regularly and get confidence at Arsenal. Others 'Clasico' faces like Dani Carvajal and Sergi Roberto have never settled into long spells in the Spain set-up. Paco Alcacer and Thiago Alcantara had to go to Borussia Dortmund and Bayern Munich to become regular starters at club and then international level.
Since first taking temporary and then full-time control of picking the team Moreno has used 32 players across six games. The new face in this latest squad is Zagreb's Olmo, which means this week's stand-out stat could be a first Croatia-based player to play competitively for Spain.
“The selection door is open because we look at both the player’s history and their current form,” Moreno says. “If someone is performing at a high level, we will call him up. We want to be fair, and having competition for places is very good. In each squad some players have the chance to take a spot from others. There is still time for all of them, and anything to happen.”
At some point the experimentation will have to end. All the chopping and changing has not brought many cohesive performances through what was a not very difficult qualifying group. The likelihood is that Villarreal will not be bulk suppliers to Moreno's XI for their Euro 2020 opener. But – for better or worse – neither Barca nor Madrid will dominate next summer's Spanish team.
