SHORTLY BEFORE 3 pm yesterday a Spanish 340 Airbus taxied to the Head of State pavilion at Madrid’s Barajas airport. Painted on one side in huge letters was a single word, “Campeones”, and two Spanish flags fluttered from the window of the cockpit.
When the doors opened and the steps were in place, the captain, Iker Casillas, appeared holding the coveted Fifa World Cup trophy aloft. He relinquished it briefly to Vicente del Bosque, the national team manager, before the team drove in a bus to a nearby hotel to rest and greet their families.
After a brief halt the fiesta continued with a visit to the royal palace where King Juan Carlos congratulated the team. The king had not been able to join Queen Sofia, Crown Prince Felipe and Princess Letizia in South Africa because a recent lung operation makes long flight inadvisable. In a brief and informal reception, the king embraced members of the team one by one, thanked them for their “exemplary team spirit” and laughingly received his own red team shirt.
They were then joined by his granddaughters, infantas Leonor (4) and Sofia (3). Queen Sofia had cheered so loud and long at the final that she had little voice left by yesterday.
The team then went to the Moncloa Palace for a larger reception given by prime minister José Luís Rodriguez Zapatero. He had invited members of his government, the Moncloa staff and told them to bring their families too.
The noisy celebrations yesterday were merely a continuation of those which carried on all Sunday night in virtually every city, town and village in Spain. After their all-night party, a few sleepy bodies found a bit of shade in Madrid to take a short siesta before continuing their partying.
In Madrid yesterday red was the colour of the day. It was worn by members of the royal family, by the thousands of people in the streets, on television screens and even by Elena Espinosa, the Spanish agriculture minister, who wore a bright red suit in Brussels where she presented her Dutch counterpart with a bag of Spanish oranges.
Hundreds of thousands of people lined the streets cheering the team in their open top bus as it snaked slowly through the streets of Madrid, pausing at emblematic sites such as Cibeles and Neptuno, both statues draped in large Spanish flags. It is estimated that as many as two million people packed the route before the bus arrived at the Puente del Rey where thousands had been enjoying a pop concert while they waited .
They braved temperatures of 36 in the shade — although there was not much shade yesterday — for up to six hours waiting for their heroes and were grateful for the Madrid fire brigade, who cooled them down with their fire hoses. Most were dressed in red and yellow, and waved Spanish and regional flags – including ones from Galicia, Asturias and the Catalan senyera, proving that where football is concerned most people in Spain forget politics.