In the 83rd minute at the Manahan Stadium in Surakarta on Thursday, live-wire Amirbek Saidov got his head to an excellent cross from the right. An inch or two either way and it would have been 3-2 to Uzbekistan over Spain. This is how close the beaten semi-finalists from the recent UEFA U-17 European Championship came to suffering what is known in their country as a “remontada”, having been 2-0 up and seemingly cruising to the three points.

After being put through the wringer already against Mali three days earlier, only to emerge with a rather fortuitous 1-0 win, Spain were certainly not head and shoulders ahead of the pack in Group B as many predicted. Looking on the positive side, however, these struggles may well prove to be the best thing that could have happened to them…