"I don't drink, so I was perfectly sober," Spain boss Luis de la Fuente insisted, and everybody laughed. It was a pretty funny thing for an international coach to say; a pretty strange thing too, but it probably needed to be said. After all, being drunk seemed like just about the only justification for what he had done and it didn't augur well for the future.
Almost the first job that former Spain U21 boss De la Fuente was given after he had taken over from Luis Enrique as the senior team manager on Dec. 8, while the World Cup was still going on without them, was to vote for The Best FIFA men's player of 2022.