A few years ago, no team could defeat Serbia. They won the Rio 2016 Games, the 2015 Kazan World Cup and chained four Europeans, from 2012 to 2018. At the same time, Spain was a depressed team. Away from the days of Estiarte , Rollán and company competed complex, with defeat always the most likely option. Now everything is different. In the last Gwangju World Cup, the team led by David Martin eliminated Serbia in the quarterfinals and this Wednesday did the same in the same round of the European. If last year the victory of the national team was underestimated because of the many casualties of the Balkan team, this time there was no possible excuse.

This Spain is already a fearsome Spain, a gold candidate in the next Tokyo 2020 Games. In the match against Serbia he made it clear, for his courage and his game, led by the returned Felipe Perrone , and especially for an incomparable man : Daniel López Pinedo .

He, who lived the sad years. He, who had a long wait. He enjoys now, at 39, the best moment of his career: he is possibly the best goalkeeper in a pool. The comeback of Spain on Wednesday began and ended in it, in the two stops in the penalty shootout that ended Serbia.

Long before, in the first quarter, Spain woke up with the crooked gesture. Dusan Mandic , the Italian Pro Recco gunman, advanced his team with two goals (2-0) and forced Martin to recapitulate rather than early. It worked. Spain that had begun shaking, linking inaccuracies, calmed down and between Perrone, Francisco Fernández and a very young Bernat Sanahuja regained control (3-5). Then a last quarter of joys was expected, but again and again the team crashed into the rival defense and the final score (6-6) forced the penalties. Nobody failed, neither Perrone, nor Adrià Delgado , nor Marc Larumbe , nor Álvaro Granados. But above all, López Pinedo was right with two stops forever. During the game it was extraordinary with 65% of stops (11 of 17 pitches), in the extra time it was more, much more than that.

On Friday Spain will face the winner of the duel between Croatia and Greece in the semifinals.

According to the criteria of The Trust Project

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