Let me make one thing clear: Spain are a dirty team. End of. They, with their considerable Barcelona contingent, who are the experts in such matters, hack, shove, grab, and writhe up there with the best of them – their great secret to success is that they are able to do this without picking up a great deal of cards or fouls. Think of the life-threatening injuries sustained by Puyol and Iniesta et al, shortly before they were up and about with a spring in their step, and a Dutch player in Webb’s ever more cluttered notebook, and you might begin to see my point.

But! For the media, who had decided that Spain were the deserved winners just about as soon as the final pairing was known, this simply isn’t the case: references to ‘brutality’, ‘thuggery’, and the like, which I read in the papers on Monday – concerning challenges other than those of De Jong and Van Bommel, which were clearly unacceptable – is one-eyed, bordering on the Gordon Brown-esque.

Yes, Holland committed some appalling fouls and, too, at times clutched their limbs as though they were detached. And yes, on the basis that Holland should probably have had a couple of players sent off, Spain’s victory was probably the right result; but they did play some good football during the game, and in those leading up to it. For the game to be etched into footballing lore as animals versus cherubims is simply wrong, and another fine example of the fantasist drivel of which our media are masters. Such articles as ‘Déja Vu’ are, frankly, baffling, as most Arsenal fans surely know to take an entire salt-pot with them when reading the day’s match reports, rather than repeat, verbatim, sections from the cuttings. The reality, surely, is that two teams with, considering the stage they were on, limited ambition and ability, and a penchant for stopping the opposition the easy way, played out an awful game of football which deserves few of the plaudits it’s receiving.