• Chronicle: Another deed for history: Spain will play the World Cup final after defeating Australia
  • Opinion: A miracle as you don't remember, by Iñako Díaz-Guerra
  • The notes of the match: one by one of Spain - Australia
  • The rival: Argentina's eternal Scola meets Spain

When Sergio Llull scored his triple room, the one that ended a night of bomb-proof hearts, after crowning a beautiful play in which Spain rotated the ball with an impossible ease after 48 minutes of battle, Marc Gasol rested his arms on the knees of pure fatigue, only in the middle of the track of the Wukesong Sports Center, where 11 years ago the team had faced the entire American empire in the Olympic final. Soon, while his companions were on the bench for the Australian dead time to straighten the already impossible (90-82 there), he threw his fist into the air. Kobe Bryant and Manu Ginobili looked at him a few meters away, sitting in the front row. A god among gods.

Marc's mission was complete, the medal already in his neck. Which will be the 11th in the last 13 tournaments for this selection of legend, which breaks the hex with the World Cups that had been maintained since the 2006 gold. Which will be the ninth medal with Spain for the pivot in the 11 championships that has disputed (only the 2015 European and the Rio Games were lost). It was his afternoon, which everyone was waiting for, despite a first half in which he had stayed in four free throws. An absolute liberation of a type that added the 114th game so far this season. «It is the norm of ketchup. You try to open, it seems that it stays closed and when the ketchup comes out it goes everywhere, ”said the coach, who has been his adventure partner in the NBA Finals.

"When you get in rhythm it's easier"

“He has uncovered the basket, has made important shots but, above all, has threatened and complicated the defensive life of others. Because having a colossus in defense [by Bogut ] who is forced to leave so much left space for others. Tactically it has been great for those spaces that it has generated ». And for the 33 points, many of them absolutely key, like when he rescued the team in the last quarter, eight down Spain, eight goals in a row and an assist to Ribas . Or with the free throws to force the extensions, none was wrong all night even though it was quite irregular during the tournament. "To which one has entered, then a couple in a row ... It is what happens sometimes, when you enter the rhythm it is easier," said the hero, as always well accompanied by Ricky in the work of leadership. His final hug was exciting, one of the images forever in the afternoon in Beijing.

You had to look in memory to find such agony. It was two other semifinals that made this group out, which changes over the years but does not lose competitiveness, the faith of the survivor. That of 2006 against Argentina, in which Nocioni missed a triple from the corner that would have been a conviction. And that of Lille 2015, also with extension, when Pau Gasol amazed the world and silenced all of France. Both feats ended in gold. "This team has always been like this for many years, we are very close, we always work together, we are very competitive and we always fight until the end," Marc said. "It was probably the best game I've ever lived in my life," he hallucinated. Juancho , one of those who begin to soak up these deeds.

"Heart and brain"

The agony sister hearts, only then the hugs are explained in the end, a mixture of joy and exhaustion. The courage to fight for each loose ball as if it were an oxygen bottle on top of Everest, the courage to hit colliders imagining that they are mills. «The sum of heart and brain», which valued a Scariolo who could not erase the smile from his face. Again his decisions were vital, his tactical tricks of a great prestidigitator about the abyss. "It's my job. I can't afford to have a bad time. What's more, you have a good time. It is one decision making after another. It is the most fun, the most beautiful. It is when you have to challenge yourself to have coldness and concentration. Reaffirm things, change or sometimes shut up without having to add a voice when it is not necessary, ”explained the guy who in a few months can achieve what no one, the NBA ring and the World title.

There wasn't even much room for party and euphoria. Especially in the oldest. Marc hurried his answers because all he was worried about was resting. He and Rudy , 34 years old, the only survivors of Saitama, were the ones who spent the longest time on the track (almost 39 minutes), just a little more than Ricky (19 points, 12 assists, seven rebounds and four steals), who said goodbye his appearance with one of his wonderful reflections: «It goes to all those people who really fight every day. This is only basketball but it can be an example of life. Things happen in life, a thousand injuries happen, a thousand defeats ... but in the end if you still believe the ball comes in ».

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