Spain are reigning World Cup and European champions. They're just getting started

The last time Spain fell off their throne and landed, with a bloody nose, on the ground with the rest of international football's plebs was in 2014 -- an ugly humiliation in Brazil where the defending champions crashed out of their FIFA World Cup group.

There's a precedent from back then to encourage England that they can land a blow to the reigning world champions' jaw at Wembley on Saturday. Maybe they can even end Spain's history-making run of 38 matches unbeaten, and inflict just a third defeat for coach Luis de la Fuente in his 50th match in charge.

But I'll wager that the collapse of 2014 isn't going to afflict this Spain generation. In fact, the task facing the world's top teams over the next four years is working out how to stop Spain winning the UEFA Nations League next summer, the 2028 UEFA European Championship, the 2029 Nations League and the 2030 World Cup, where Spain are co-hosts.

- Stargazing: Inside the final days of Spain's victorious World Cup campaign
- How Spain built historic dominance of both men's and women's games
- Should England try to emulate Spain or embrace Premier League 'chaos'?

Let's get one thing straight: Anyone who says that type of trophy haul will definitely happen is a fool -- and would just be seeking notoriety. And if you are snorting into your morning coffee, deriding the very idea then, admittedly, the odds favor you being right.

But, having been embedded with Spain during their glorious era of triumphs at Euro 2008, the 2010 World Cup 2010 and Euro 2012 and then again when they've won their past three tournaments -- the 2023 Nations League, Euro 2024 and this year's World Cup -- I can promise you that in talent production, attitude, hunger, leadership, tournament mentality, unity and ambition they have no equal. The challenge of winning the next four straight senior tournaments is both something they'll be aiming at and within their potential, no matter how daunting and unprecedented.

In case you don't remember the utter domination of Spain's own galáctico era between 2008 and 2012, they won their continental championship, the World Cup and their continental crown again sequentially. That was something that no other nation in the entire history of men's international soccer had ever achieved before.

Then, it all went spectacularly wrong. They were eliminated in the group stage in Brazil two years after retaining their European crown. Cue rancor and finger-pointing from sated players whose discipline and hunger had rusted. It was a mess.

Compared to the current version of La Roja, that national team was stuffed with stars who don't just merit discussion as all-time Spain legends but should be on the sport's all-time pantheon of greats: Xavi, Andrés Iniesta, David Silva, Sergio Busquets, Gerard Piqué, Carlos Puyol, Sergio Ramos.

How many of the squad which just conquered the world again do you consider either outright world-best in their position -- let alone an all-time great? Numbers and opinions will vary, but the tally won't approach what De la Fuente's predecessors Luis Aragonés and Vicente del Bosque had at their disposal.

"What I'm still left asking to this day is how, between 2012 and 2014, things were allowed to degenerate and to break down within the Spain squad," Joan Capdevila, who played every minute for Spain at Euro 2008 (barring a dead rubber vs. Greece) and the 2010 World Cup, tells ESPN. "That was crazy!

"The Clásicos [between Barcelona and Real Madrid] were so full of nastiness and kicking and shoving that it impacted. By 2014 we'd almost have been better not going to Brazil.

"But that was also because it was the end of a cycle -- everything combined at once. Del Bosque was pretty much obliged to take those who'd won the 2012 Euros but it wasn't the same -- a sell-by date was arriving. We'd run out of gas."

It was exactly a decade after that rot began to set in that De la Fuente became Spain manager and promptly lost his second game in charge, against Scotland at Hampden Park. It sparked a vicious media campaign of sneering and criticism, which only served to stiffen his players' resolve. Two-and-a-half months later they won the 2023 Nations League final against Croatia in Rotterdam, a first trophy in 11 years

"They were tough months after that defeat in Scotland, but it made us better and tougher and stronger," De la Fuente told UEFA. "We understood nothing would be given to us for free.

"After that Nations League win, the team changed. Everyone finally felt like we could win titles again. But, even then, the demands we placed on ourselves required us to already be thinking about how to win, win again, and keep winning.

"I'm all about messages that resonate with the player's mindset and philosophy, so I told them: 'Gentlemen, we have proven that with this approach, this philosophy, we can win. Let's build, but do things even better.'"

That was De la Fuente in Year 1, but it's a clue to what's happening now and what the next four years might yield. Nonstop striving to outdo themselves.

But, if having an abundance of superstar players wasn't the recipe for maintaining iron-clad domination, as was proved the last time Spain sat unchallenged on the world throne, then what is? It's the fact that the Spanish teaching school -- for players and coaches -- isn't only the best in the world. It's the best ever. By a distance. A constant production line of technically superb, tactically intelligent, hungry, disciplined, team-focused gems.

"After the [2026 World Cup] final I was on the pitch in New Jersey," Capdevila says. "I went looking for Pedri because he's a great kid. I said to him: 'None of you even look all that excited or happy! You're reacting like winning the World Cup is just business as usual.'

"The other thing I said to Pedri was: 'Listen to me! With this one, you lot could win three straight World Cups!' For age, ability, confidence ... in four years these young guys will be getting to an amazing level of experience and maturity. And that World Cup is in Spain -- look out! They're demonstrating such superiority now, but playing at home, well ..."

Capdevila, who is now part of the development staff at Espanyol, adds: "By comparison with 2014, this Spain group now has plenty in the tank and I can envisage the winning going on. First, for the general age profile of the wider group of players, but most of all for the Spanish youth development system. It's the best football education anywhere in the world -- there's nobody who teaches and produces young players like we do. Every club in Spain has excellence in how it trains and educates and develops.

"The Spain system of play right now compared with our generation, which won the three straight tournaments, has really evolved. We didn't have [the] wide wingers De la Fuente does in Nico Williams, Lamine Yamal, Yéremy Pino, Víctor Muñoz ... So it's clear that the system has changed, but the philosophy is absolutely identical: Want the ball, hunt it, possession used intelligently, play for one another, work for one another, pressing, position, passion."

At the youth level, Spain have become a winning machine. In men's Olympic soccer, they won the silver medal in 2021 and gold in 2025. They have played four finals in the past nine editions, and eight players from the team that started the 2021 final -- Unai Simón, Pedri, Marc Cucurella, Dani Olmo, Mikel Merino, Mikel Oyarzabal, Martín Zubimendi and Eric García -- went on to win the World Cup five years later.

Spain are winners, finalists or semifinalists in five of the past seven Euro U21 tournaments and already qualified for Euro 2027. They are the all-time record winners at the U21 tournament level (and at senior level, too). At Euro U19 level, they are winners (three), finalists or semifinalists in five of the past six competitions -- again, all-time record holders in this competition. Spain's U17s haven't won since 2017 -- World Cup winners Ferran Torres and Eric García were in that victorious squad -- and here, too, they are record champions with nine wins in 15 finals.

Production line, right? Now let's see how that has filtered through to the senior level.

The Euro 2024 final against England was marked by Rodri going off injured at 0-0. Zubimendi came on and played as well as, if not better than, the player who would win that year's Ballon d'Or while Spain threatened to run away with the second half. When I asked De la Fuente about that change after the game, he said: "In Martín I'm privileged to be able to count on the second-best player in the world in that position."

In winning that trophy, and for the year or so that Rodri was out injured, Zubimendi (aided by Pedri, Gavi, Merino and Fabián Ruiz) never missed a beat. Business as usual.

"Spain is registering 70% possession in almost every match -- that's a hell of a difficult thing to achieve," Capdevila says. "Sergio Busquets, a super important part of our generation's success and playing style, eventually retires and, within no time at all, along comes Rodri then 'Zubi'.

"That's something that means we should all congratulate the Spanish school of youth football training -- the absolute key is that it will always produce the types of players, which the national team coach requires. The defensive pivot is, now, the most important position. The Rodri role. He does everything, organizes, defends and moves thing forward. With the ball, without the ball.

"So, where's the next Rodri? I don't know for certain right now, but what I am certain of is someone out there in Spain is building him, training and developing the Rodri replacement."

Maybe that guy is Barça's Marc Bernal, Real Madrid's Thiago Pitarch or Bournemouth's Chema Andrés. Other candidates are in the queue. But the conveyor belt rolls on irresistibly.

There were five changes between Spain's 2023 Nations League final XI and the team that started the Euro 2024 final, then five more changes for the 2025 Nations League final and a further six for the World Cup final. The more things change, the more they stay the same.

"It's their way of thinking about the game," Thierry Henry, a Champions League winner with Barça, told CBS when asked about Spain's domination. "They don't build or create individuals. They create teams. And so it doesn't matter who plays in it, they have a philosophy, or of seeing the game.

The former striker, himself a World Cup and Euros winner with France, continued: "[As France Olympic coach] I came across a Spain team that won the Olympic final against our team, but their group also won the Euro U21 and the Euro U19. They try to keep guys together, the best when they train with the best.

"Also, it's always better with a good philosophy. If you want to reach a certain level, you've got to think [about] the game. Spanish players think one to two to three steps ahead. They don't just receive the ball and then start to think."

Spain's success has bred success. On the night that he lifted the World Cup trophy as captain after winning the 2010 final, Iker Casillas told me: "We've already been in a golden age for Spanish sport in general, but I wish I'd seen a Spaniard lifting the World Cup when I was growing up. Now, I hope, us showing the way will inspire young Spanish footballers to repeat this."

Casillas' dream has come true. His teammate that day, Capdevila, says: "Two of my sons are already in the club system. When I was thinking about playing for Spain my prayer was to reach a World Cup and play even just one minute. My boys talk to me about how they want to win the World Cup in their careers. That's a generational change of mentality."

Now that he has a contract until 2032 it's crystal clear who's going to be at the helm of this four-trophy quest -- De la Fuente.

"I've lived through different football eras, including what I call the 'command and control' approach,'" he says. "Back in our days as footballers, they would tell us where to run, and we'd just do it without asking any questions.

"However, as I developed as a footballer and matured as a person, I started asking the manager to explain things to me a bit more at just 18 years old in the top flight. I was going to do what I was ordered to because I'm very disciplined, but convince me, give me a reason, tell me why I have to do it, and I'll do it.

"The same thing applies nowadays. Coaches who are afraid to work like this are probably just letting their own insecurities get the better of them. Some people shy away from it because they're scared, believing that using authority and instilling fear will have a greater impact on a footballer than treating them with respect and talking to them rationally. I don't think so."

It all begins again for Spain at Wembley. A firm test against a nation whose recent tournament record is good, if not golden, and who are recent double Euro U21 champions. While still celebrating with the trophy on the pitch at MetLife stadium, one of De la Fuente's players, with whom he has worked the longest, trotted up to him and asked: "OK boss, what's next for us to win?" De la Fuente immediately replied: "The next game -- against England!"

The coach told me: "That's the mentality of my team -- forever hungry in their pursuit of glory and achievements."