VIVA ESPANA!

You see, my father lives in Spain and has done so for the last 12 years. Indeed, my relationship with the country of Fernando Torres, David Villa and Cesc Fabregas goes back a good deal further than that.
Somewhere, hopefully hidden in a suitcase in an attic and never to be seen again, is a picture of an overawed nine-year-old riding through the Spanish countryside aboard a donkey, accompanied by his dad.
Probably in the same attic is a picture of that young lad some four or five years later, perched precariously on a barrier in the stands at Barcelona's Nou Camp Stadium. He's wearing a Barcelona shirt and can still recall the exhilaration at being in what was then the largest sports venue he'd ever set foot in.
I've been dangerously ill with tonsilitis in a car in the southern Spanish desert, watched my mother enjoy one of the last holidays of her life in Spain before she was taken by cancer at the age of 49 and seen the country's joys help rebuild my father's life from that low point 20 years ago.
I've spent a fascinating evening watching the Spanish equivalent of non-league football in Corralejo on Fuerteventura in the Canary Islands, declined the chance to attend a bullfight in Majorca (my dad went, though) and sat through inspiring church services and glittering weddings without understanding a word, yet still felt uplifted afterwards.
I've lost my wife in the Spanish countryside for what became the longest three hours of my life, ended only when I managed to make myself understood in German to a motorist at a petrol station.
Given all that, perhaps you'll understand why I'll be searching for a replica Spain shirt this weekend.
I'll admit I didn't think Torres and Co would get this far. When my friends and I conducted a straw poll pre-tournament, we all took the cliched view that the Spanish would bottle it, as they always have done.
Only when they edged past Italy in the quarter-finals last weekend did I wonder whether this was their year, but Wednesday's display against Russia surely earned them the support of anyone who likes football played the right way.
One more thing. The last time Spain won a major tournament was 1964 - the year of my birth.
That'll do for me. Viva Espana!