Instead of talking to the world's press, the Spanish team decided instead to perform for us, weaving past the microphones in a conga as they belted out 'Y Viva Espana' with rare old gusto. And as they danced, you couldn't help but look at these exultant young champions and wonder if we're going to have to get used to them waltzing to major championship triumphs from now on.

It wasn't just the fresh-faced 21-year-old Cesc Fabregas boogying away which would have made any English football fan's heart ache with envy.

Behind came the dazzling match winner Fernando Torres (24), those midfield magicians Andres Iniesta (24), David Silva (22), Xabi Alonso (26) and David Villa (26), one of the men of the tournament who hadn't even played the final. Even the grand general, Xavi, was only 28. Ah, such talent and still so much time ahead of them to improve.

So where was the last crumb of consolation for England now? That idea that somewhere out there was a major footballing nation as culpable as us in blowing it at major championships?

Gone in 90 majestic minutes during which Spain achieved something we could hardly conceive of. That is, not just outclassing Germany in a major final, making them suffer defeat by a thousand cutting passes, but ultimately reducing them to something akin to impotence.

Forget the one goal margin; three, four, five wouldn't have flattered Spain. Forget Jens Lehmann's rant that poor refereeing lay behind the German defeat - for dear old Jens to call Roberto Rosetti "arrogant" brought to mind visions of pots and kettles - because by the end his team were so bereft of ideas on not just how to pressurise the Spaniards but even how just how to get the ball off them that it felt an act of mercy when Rosetti blew for time.

The Spanish captain Iker Casillas, still only 27 himself, said: "The great thing? The happiness because we were all so sick and tired of failing at the quarterfinals."

Yes, the same symptoms as the English disease, but one now cured after 44 years of hurt so majestically that, freed from any more inferiority complexes, they all now feel they could go to South Africa in two years and win the World Cup.

Having done extraordinarily well just a month before his 70th birthday to survive the celebratory bumps by the team who know him affectionately as "grandad",Luis Aragones cast his mind back to that European Championship win in Madrid in 1964 when, though he hadn't played in the final against the Soviet Union, he had been part of the squad.

Now he recognised the same kind of one-for-all spirit which has not always existed in a national team with its distinct factions from the Castilian to the Catalan to the Basque. Here was Spain United FC and they were magnificent. "Our players on the bench today felt it just like I did all those years ago," said the coach. "We have won in a brilliant way. All those who love football want just that - to see good combinations, teams attacking the penalty area going for goals.

"We can start saying we can win anything now. I've often thought that if I could manage this team reasonably well then we would be champions."

Well, he did more than reasonably well. Aragones, the oldest coach ever to win a European title, had ridden into these championships on a wave of abuse from press and public but leaves this Spanish team for a new job in Turkey