At 1.22 in the morning Berlin time, Henri Delaunay headed towards Checkpoint Charlie hidden inside a plain metal trunk. It wasn’t until he was safely on board the bus beneath the Olympic stadium that Álvaro Morata opened the case and took the cup out again, the European champions rolling out into the dark and the direction of a hotel on Marlene Dietrich Platz, less than a mile from the crossing, where families and friends waited for them. They had actually done it, let the party continue.
That afternoon, a few hours before the biggest moment of their lives, five Spain players were chatting after lunch. A month earlier, before they had even set off for Germany, Morata had insisted that it was going to be a substitute that decided it; now, sitting round a table at the Grand Hyatt hotel, Álex Remiro, the third-choice goalkeeper and the only member of the squad who had not played a minute at Euro 2024, told Mikel Oyarzabal that tonight he was going to be the one. And so it was.
Oyarzabal missed the last World Cup with injury, and there was a sense of something lost on the long road back. “In those moments, negative thoughts come to your mind: what will become of me, how will I get back,” he said. “But with so many people’s help, you can be the same as you were before, or adapt to what you are now and do something else. Just being here is something big.” Here, he scored the goal that took Spain to their fourth European Championship, a record. A first for every member of this team, except Jesús Navas, bidding farewell with two of them.
There were still four minutes left when Oyarzabal scored, Spain’s players crowding the technical area, unable to sit. Morata was in tears already. When the full-time whistle went, they flooded the pitch. Nico Williams went in search of his mum: his medal was for her. Players called to security staff to allow their families on to the pitch, which wasn’t always easy, so some clambered into the stands instead. There was confetti everywhere, pictures to be taken. Shirts were handed out, No 4 on the back. Kings of Europe, they said.
Lamine Yamal collected his trophy as the tournament’s best young player, Rodri was presented with the MVP, and Dani Olmo was joint top scorer. In the final, he had not scored, but he had cleared one off the line, a moment to put in a frame and on the wall along with so many other images. Every player had excelled. At the start of the tournament, Morata was asked if Spain really had any world-class players, the kind that could win the Ballon d’Or. Yes, he said, naming Rodri and Pedri and insisting that Williams and Lamine Yamal would be candidates one day.
One day soon. “It seems I’ve got an eye for a player,” Morata said now, laughing. “You can choose one, anyone!” It wouldn’t be easy: there was something resolutely collective in this, half a dozen or more candidates for the best footballer over the past month. No single star, which was no bad thing, but 26 of them. Or 27: Gavi, 19 years old and injured, had flown in to spend the day with his teammates; he spent some of the night on their shoulders.
Few defined that solidarity, that togetherness, quite like Navas: the Sevilla full-back says he has been in pain every day for six years with a hip problem. When he was one of the 10 non-first-teamers to play Spain’s third game, he got an ankle injury in the first minute but carried on for 89 more because, he said, he knew that Dani Carvajal needed a rest. Now not only do Spain have the youngest ever winner of this competition, they have the oldest too. Lamine Yamal’s dad, wearing a shirt printed with 304, the postcode of their Rocafonda neighbourhood, is younger than Navas.
That unity has been Luis de la Fuente’s focus, his obsession. “We’re a true team, European champions,” he said. It has been Morata’s, too. The Atlético Madrid forward, who had previously suggested this would be his last game with Spain but wasn’t going to talk about that post-game, lifted the trophy; this was his moment, but it was shared with all of them, and his teammates couldn’t be happier for a different kind of captain, the best they have had. Their affection, Morata said, “is worth more than 20 goals at the Euros. I feel like the luckiest person alive.”
Morata also publicly thanked Andrés Iniesta and Bojan Krkic, responsible for him even being there; without them, he wouldn’t be. They too had suffered with mental health issues and now they had guided him. “In the end there is light,” he said. In the end, he hopped off the stage carrying the 8kg of sterling silver named after the Uefa general secretary whose idea this whole thing was. The Henri Delaunay Cup was redesigned in 2008: since then, Spain have won three of the five there have been. No one has dominated an era like this; no one had dominated a tournament like this generation, either. Seven games, seven wins with no need for penalties. Four World Cup winners defeated.
“Previous generations showed us the way,” Rodri said. “In the end, getting the hard side of the draw was a blessing. It speaks to the mentality of the team. This is something that is cultivated; many of us were champions at under-19 and under-21 level. The manager knew what he was doing. I’ve won many things with my club and that was brutal. But the feeling you have constructing something with your country, it’s something you can’t even describe. We saw Spain at the top when we were very little. You see them and think, wow. And now … well, my voice is breaking.”
Mikel Merino recalled: “Those photos we saw of the Spanish national team when we were kids … we have made history too. We knew we had an extraordinary group. Even after that game against Scotland when it seemed we were teetering on the edge, we were clear.” And so they were champions, which no one except them had expected.
In the time between them winning the title and getting back to the dressing room, someone had gone down there and redone the decoration, a sign going up all along the wall in tournament colours and tournament font, above the benches: “European Champions,” it said. The fridge had been packed with Bitburgers. They didn’t empty it and didn’t empty all the five-litre glasses either, beer abandoned as they headed off. The champagne, giant bottles of the stuff, had gone, sprayed more than drunk, the place soaked. Fruit was left behind, energy gels and cures for cramp, as they headed out to the right and along the corridor.
The first to the bus were Ferran Torres and Fabián Ruiz, bouncing match balls as mementos. David Raya was next, beer in hand, shouting something about a haircut. Ayoze Pérez showed his medal. Navas, the oldest player in the team, managed to look like the youngest, almost a sweetness to the boyish smile, a look of disbelief.
At 1.22am, the trophy came past in the box, wheeled towards the bus unbeknownst to anyone, smuggled out. Then came Merino and Martín Zubimendi. Olmo and Álex Baena came with Morata, the captain carrying a huge black boombox. Potra Salvaje was the song. As they went, a member of the coaching staff gazed in their direction, admiration clear. This is a new era, he dared to suggest: these guys are so good and so convinced; even when they concede it doesn’t matter.
“The future is theirs,” De la Fuente said. “Just so long as they give me tickets,” Morata said. At 1.37am, Williams appeared. At 1.39am, Lamine Yamal, handed pieces of paper to sign, a star not so much in the making but already made. Plans for the party in Madrid came through. “Get the hips ready, we’re going to break them,” Williams said.
At the hotel, family members wondered what was taking them so long. On the bus, someone climbed behind the wheel, honk-honk, honk-honk-honking. Rodri came with his player of the tournament trophy, limping heavily. And then, at 1.52am, Morata being Morata. “Where’s the manager?” he asked.
There he was, the last man out, the coach some hadn’t heard of a month ago, in whose team few believed. Not like he believes, anyway. “That’s normal and there’s always time to change that: wise men rectify their errors,” De la Fuente conceded, not least because why would he care now?
“This is a dream. It’s very nice to win the title but the journey, the way we did it, is even better. I’m not sure we’re aware of how big this is. They’re here today because they’re the best. I hope people recognise that now, put them in their rightful place. I don’t know if you listened, but I always told you I had the 26 best players in the world.”
The best in Europe, anyway, sitting there waiting for him on the bus, the word “Champion” up in the window where the destination should be – 26 men and one box. The Henri Delaunay Cup is inside and it is theirs. Morata takes it out carefully and, at 2.16am, carries it into the hotel on Marlene Dietrich Platz where those who never abandoned them wait, his mission here completed.
