Iniesta: Euro final has no relevance

ANDRES INIESTA insists Spain’s Euro 2008 final victory over Germany will give them no psychological advantage when the sides meet in the last four of the World Cup.

Iniesta was voted the man of the match as Spain overcame Paraguay 1-0 in the Ellis Park Stadium on Saturday night thanks to a late goal from David Villa.

Now they will face the on-song Germans who followed up their 4-1 win over England by thrashing Argentina 4-0 in the quarter-finals.

Barcelona star Iniesta said: “It’s the same as the Euro final. We will be playing Germany again. But I think it has nothing to do with what happened two years ago. That will have no part to play when we meet.

“Germany have played a brilliant World Cup so far and they have brought in a lot of young players who were not there in 2008.

“They must be tremendously motivated but we are also at the top of our game and keen to progress further.”

Iniesta added: “I am sure it will be a match between two sides who enjoy having the ball and it’s going to be a beautiful battle. We have been following Germany’s progress throughout the World Cup and they have done spectacularly well.”

Iniesta is proud to be part of the first Spain side to reach the semi-finals of football’s biggest tournament.

But he was full of praise for Paraguay who held out until seven minutes from time in a match where both sides had a penalty saved.

He said: “We knew it was going to be difficult as throughout the World Cup Paraguay had made life difficult for all their rivals.

“They gave it everything but we are very proud, very happy to be among the four best teams in the world.

“The team is doing very well. It’s a fantastic feeling but the job is not finished yet. We are all pleased to have got so far but we will now start focusing on the match with Germany.”

Iniesta is adamant that a collective spirit is a major reason for Spain’s success.

He said: “I was voted man of match, which makes me very happy, but without my team-mates I would not get these awards.

“It the same with David Villa. He has scored five goals so far but he would say without his team-mates he wouldn’t score goals.

“The strength of the team is us playing together and fighting together.”

While Villa again grabbed the headlines, goalkeeper and skipper Iker Casillas made an equally telling contribution.

The Real Madrid player denied Oscar Cardozo from the penalty spot – with a little help from Spain number two Pepe Reina – and produced a couple of fine reflex saves.

He said: “The penalty was a pivotal moment and I was fortunate enough to save it.

“To tell the truth I dived that way because I’d been chatting about it with Pepe Reina before the game.

“He said that Cardozo usually hit the ball hard and to his right-hand side. So, it came down to a mix of intuition, good luck and a team-mate’s help.”

Centre-back Carlos Marchena added: “We’ve got total faith in him as a keeper because he’s very good, and today he proved that emphatically.

Villa said: “Iker, as always, was faultless. We know just how many times he’s come to our rescue and how many times he’ll do so in the future.”

Meanwhile, Paraguay’s Roque Santa Cruz insisted there was no point dwelling on what may or may not have been after Paraguay bowed out of the World Cup.

“We don’t talk about things that could or could not have happened,” he said.

“Of course in that case, we had a penalty that we missed. Besides that we kept doing the same job and I think we kept ourselves very much in the game until the second half where they had two or three chances.

“But we also had our chances and we didn’t make them into the goals we needed to get back into the game. So we are still very pleased with the performance we did.”

Santa Cruz, though, paid tribute to what the South Americans had achieved in South Africa, from topping their group, which also included Italy, to being amongst the best eight countries in the world.

He continued: “We are proud as Paraguay with the overall performance.

“We still believe that we didn’t perform probably as well as we expected, but we are in the most important football tournament in the world where opponents are all much tougher than we usually have in friendlies.

“So we are happy with what we achieved.”

PARAGUAY: Villar, Veron, Alcaraz, Da Silva, Morel Rodriguez, Victor Caceres (Barrios 84), Santana, Edgar Barreto (Vera 64), Riveros, Haedo Valdez (Santa Cruz 72), Cardozo.

SPAIN: Casillas, Sergio Ramos, Pique, Puyol (Marchena 84), Capdevila, Busquets, Iniesta, Alonso (Pedro 75), Xavi, Villa, Torres (Fabregas 56). Referee: Carlos Batres (Guatemala).