Euro 2024 last-16 clash with Georgia is young Spain star Lamine Yamal’s next exam

BERLIN – Spain are focused on defeating Georgia on June 30 to reach the Euro 2024 quarter-finals, and so is their 16-year-old star Lamine Yamal after receiving some good news to clear his head.

Before La Roja tackle their last-16 assignment in Cologne, Yamal discovered he had passed the country’s end-of-secondary-school exams.

Still studying when the tournament began in Germany on June 14, he shone in Spain’s first two matches and was rested for the majority of the third with the team already through top of Group B.

While thoughts started to drift towards the knockout stage, the right-winger was still waiting on his results.

“I came out from the training session and was told it all went well,” Yamal said on June 27.

“I saw the grades on my phone and I had passed so I just closed the app, called my mum.”

Spain aced their “Group of Death” examination, overcoming Croatia, Italy and Albania to finish the opening phase with a 100 per cent record and three clean sheets.

“Everything we’ve done in the group phase serves for nothing if on Sunday they knock us out,” warned Yamal.

“We have played against them before, but we know that it won’t be the same game.”

The Spaniards thrashed Georgia 7-1 in a Euro qualifier in September 2023, a match in which Yamal became the country’s youngest player and scorer at barely 16.

If the Barcelona winger, who turns 17 on July 13 – the day before the Euro final, manages to find the net against Georgia or any prospective future rounds, he will become the youngest scorer in competition history.

The record is held by Switzerland’s Johan Vonlanthen, who scored when he was 18 years and 141 days old in 2004.

Spain head into the match – and this tournament – much changed from sides of old.

They ruled international football between their 2008 and 2012 Euro triumphs, playing possession football and dominating their opponents with the ball.

As recently as the 2022 World Cup, they still enjoyed majority possession but badly lacked cutting edge in attack. With Yamal and his left-wing counterpart Nico Williams, they seemed to have now found the missing pieces.

“When you have wingers like that, it makes the other team worry,” Spain defender Alejandro Grimaldo said.

“In one-on-one battles they are unstoppable. They give the team the ability to be direct.”

With the duo, Spain have not kept the ball as much, having the seventh-most possession on average at Euro 2024.

Against Croatia in their 3-0 victory, they had less than 50 per cent possession. But it mattered not as they split their opponents open, with Yamal’s cross creating the third goal for Dani Carvajal.

The teenager’s ascension has been so quick that his more established peers are stunned by it.

“He should be banned (given) what this kid is doing at 16 years of age,” said his Barcelona and Spain teammate Ferran Torres.

“I’ll report him to the police after 14 July... let him help us win it first.”

Should Spain progress to the quarter-finals they could face hosts Germany, a clash that would arguably be the biggest game of Yamal’s career to date.

But the youngster has risen to meet every challenge thus far, be it mathematics and history, or elite defenders on football’s biggest stages. AFP