{"id":30425,"date":"2025-06-05T22:58:18","date_gmt":"2025-06-05T22:58:18","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/spain-5-4-france-lamine-yamal-and-all-time-classic-are-these-world-cup-favourites\/"},"modified":"2025-06-05T22:58:18","modified_gmt":"2025-06-05T22:58:18","slug":"spain-5-4-france-lamine-yamal-and-all-time-classic-are-these-world-cup-favourites","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/spain-5-4-france-lamine-yamal-and-all-time-classic-are-these-world-cup-favourites\/","title":{"rendered":"Spain 5-4 France: Lamine Yamal and all-time classic – are these World Cup favourites?"},"content":{"rendered":"


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Spain and France played out a Nations League semi-final game for the ages with a scoreline that looks like it belongs in a penalty shootout.<\/b><\/p>\n

The 5-4 win for Spain<\/a> has everyone wondering if anyone can stop these attackers – although the less said about the defenders, the better.<\/p>\n

Spain, who play Portugal in Sunday’s final, are looking for a third Uefa tournament success in a row having won the last Nations League and Euro 2024.<\/p>\n

And they are favourites for the World Cup coming up next summer, with France second on the list.<\/p>\n

Spain showed why they will be tough to stop after one of the most exciting international games in memory.<\/p>\n

A total of 40 shots, 17 on target, nine goals. Spain led 4-0 and 5-1 – and threatened to blow France away – before their rivals rallied.<\/p>\n

If only every match was like this.<\/p>\n

“It was a crazy game,” said Spain goalscorer Mikel Merino. “Not the best game for the coaches – nobody wants to concede so many goals – but an amazing game for the fans.”<\/p>\n

His boss Luis de la Fuente seemed to actually disagree with him.<\/p>\n

“I’m happy. I enjoy suffering! I don’t understand sport without suffering,” he said.<\/p>\n

“When two great teams face off like today, it’s normal every team makes the most of their moments.”<\/p>\n

Lamine Yamal, who turns 18 later this summer, netted twice for Spain to cement his credentials as a Ballon d’Or contender. <\/p>\n

He is up to six goals for his country now, to add to 25 for club side Barcelona. <\/p>\n

Yamal impressed more than France’s PSG stars – Ousmane Dembele and Desire Doue – who were hyped up pre-game after phenomenal club seasons.<\/p>\n

Les Bleus debutant Rayan Cherki help spark France’s fightback after coming off the bench to show why he is being linked to Liverpool and Manchester City.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n


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Source link <\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Spain and France played out a Nations League semi-final game for the ages with a scoreline that looks like it belongs in a penalty shootout. The 5-4 win for Spain has everyone wondering if anyone can stop these attackers – although the less said about the defenders, the better. Spain, who play Portugal in Sunday’s […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":30426,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[9495,10412,805,10413,972,10410,2858,510,10411],"class_list":["post-30425","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-top-news","tag-alltime","tag-classic","tag-cup","tag-favourites","tag-france","tag-lamine","tag-spain","tag-world","tag-yamal"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30425","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=30425"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30425\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":30427,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/30425\/revisions\/30427"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/30426"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=30425"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=30425"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/news.godj.com\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=30425"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}