Mariano Rajoy didn't even wait a single night. As soon as Spain had booked their place in the World Cup final, the former prime minister returned to his opinion column in 'El Debate' (source in Spanish) with a new piece, entitled 'You need to keep your sense of humour', in which he revisits, without softening it in the slightest, the row he himself had sparked days earlier over the French national team.
The text devotes its opening paragraphs to the match, praising Luis de la Fuente and the team's efforts before moving on to politics. There, Rajoy takes a veiled swipe at Pedro Sánchez, saying he hopes Spain wins, "not that the best team win", as he himself stresses, in a clear allusion to the message the prime minister had sent him after his previous article.
Rajoy ends with a line that sums up his attitude since the affair blew up: "You already know what I'm like and what I think. Long live Spain! We've won once again."
A row that started earlier
It all began with the column that Rajoy published after Spain's victory over Belgium in the quarter-finals, where he described France as a team "of a very high level" but, he added, "without French players". The phrase was interpreted as casting doubt on the nationality of players such as Mbappé, Dembélé or Olise, the sons of Cameroonian, Malian or Congolese families, even though they were born or naturalised in France. The French embassy pointed out that 23 of the 26 players called up were born on French soil, and Sánchez's government, along with several French ministers, branded his words xenophobic.
