Seventeen titles in five years - why Spain are a dominant force — SkimNews
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- Spain won the Under-20 Women's World Cup via penalty shootout against Korea on Sunday, their 17th world or European title across age categories and genders in the past five years.
- La Roja became the first nation to hold the men's and women's World Cup simultaneously, after the women beat England 1-0 in the 2023 Sydney final and the men beat Argentina 1-0 in this summer's New Jersey final.
- Luis de la Fuente, appointed Spain men's coach in December 2022 without ever having managed a major club, delivered the 2023 Nations League, Euro 2024, 2024 Olympic gold, and 2026 World Cup inside roughly three years.
- Spain extended their unbeaten run to 39 matches across all competitions after Saturday's Nations League victory over England — the longest such streak by any European or South American national team in history.
- Lamine Yamal became the third-youngest player to feature in a World Cup final, behind Pelé (17 years, 249 days in 1958) and Italy's Giuseppe Bergomi (18 years, 201 days in 1982); teammate Pau Cubarsi started the final aged 19 years and 178 days.
- Barcelona's women's academy, nonexistent a decade ago, helped produce back-to-back Spain Nations League wins in 2024 and 2025 and three-time Champions League winner Vicky Lopez, still 19.
Why it matters: Spain's structural advantage lies in a unified youth pipeline producing titles across both men's and women's categories, with Yamal, Cubarsi, and Lopez all still teenagers — a foundation built on decade-long investment in women's academies that rival federations have not replicated at the same scale.
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