Enrique's Spain begin their march in emphatic fashion

18 Aged 18 years and 110 days, Gavi is the youngest goalscorer in a World Cup match since Pele in the 1958 final against Sweden (17y 249d).

- Siddharth Saxena

Al Thumama Stadium (Doha): If this was the Group of Death that they said it was, then Spain were simply killing it. Either you’d die of boredom, or like Costa Rica, of sheer fatigue in trying to stay in the game without a feel of the ball, because the other team, those ball hogs, just wouldn’t let you have it. It all depended on which side of the idea you stood.

Spain took the field knowing they had to start well. Anything less than that — especially in the light of Japan tumbling Germany over in the opening Group E game, a terrific 2-1 win for every underdog — would be making things difficult in what was considered as the World Cup’s toughest group at the draw.

Three-nothing up by the first half-hour, if you really wanted to understand the extent of domination (72 % possession) of the Spanish side, you’d have wanted to understand the nature of it first. The number of missed opportunities within that half-hour would have matched the number of passes they stitched together. While it looked as if almost for fun, there was method to it. It would leave the Costa Ricans simply too exhausted to react, leave alone try to make a game of it.