Spanish Sports and Political Interests

Spain is celebrating and it is really an exciting time to be breathing and living the atmosphere.

This year Spain finally won their long awaited title in football "Soccer" as the 2010 FIFA World Cup Champions. In fact, it has been an amazing couple of years in Spanish sports and as you walk through the streets and listen to radio stations you will often hear them comment that they have won almost every deportive title possible.  In the NBA you have Pau Gasol and is brother Marc. Pau is playing for the Los Angeles Lakers and has taken "Spain" to the top of the NBA. In the Formula 1 you have Fernando Alonso driving for Ferrari and in Tennis the often ranked number one player Rafael Nadal. The list goes on and on demonstrating to the world the fierce deportive competiveness of their people.

Lately if you travel through Spain you will see more national flags and people dressed in their red and yellow jerseys celebrating their football world championship. It is an insteresting event to experience, especially when you take into account that the majority of Spanish provinces are fiercely divided politically and many mantain a different national identity.

As we all know, Spain has been suffering from economic crisis and the general question floating about is whether or not these national victories will be strong enough to unite the country long enough for the various political interests to come to some productive agreements.

Based on my personal observations, I can only comment that although the champions all dawned the same national jerseys, many of them also accessorized with their various regional flags - never forgetting where their true nationality lies.

As an American by nationality, I could never imagine the same occurence in the USA. Despite the large country with 50 states and many diversified backgrounds, if the US Soccer team were to have won the national title they surely would appear with the only symbol that unites all Americans: the American flag.

Only time will tell whether or not sports can positively influence a country so politically historically divided.

What do you think?