Oyarzabal’s goals send dominant Spain past Austria

INGLEWOOD, California:

Although Spain arrived at this year’s World Cup as a championship favourite and then went unbeaten through group play, those first three matches weren’t overly impressive.

When the knockout rounds finally arrived on Thursday, the star-studded team turned on their full talent and served notice that Spain can be just as good as everybody thought — and they’re probably getting better.

Mikel Oyarzabal scored two goals and Spain beat Austria 3-0 for their first World Cup victory in a knockout match since winning the title in 2010.

Pedro Porro added a goal in the second half as La Roja put on their most impressive performance of the tournament, while demonstrating offensive creativity and defensive rigour throughout their vaunted line-up.

“The great teams step up when it’s needed,” Spain coach Luis De La Fuente said. “We played a great match. We came close to perfection, but we must keep improving.”

While Oyarzabal, fullback Marc Cucurella and winger Lamine Yamal all had sensational moments in attack, Spain also have yet to allow a goal at this year’s World Cup. Austria failed to get a shot on target, so Unai Simón didn’t have to make a save while keeping his fourth consecutive clean sheet and setting a World Cup record with 519 consecutive shutout minutes dating back to the last tournament in Qatar.

Everybody in a red shirt was happy after a dominant day in the Los Angeles area — but nobody was satisfied, either.

“I’m happy to have helped the team for us to go through another round,” Oyarzabal said. “Now just rest and get ready for the next one. It was a complicated match. We knew that it was going to be difficult against a very physical team, but we had a very good day and played a good match.”

Goalkeeper Alexander Schlager made six saves in an outstanding performance for Austria, which reached the knockout rounds of their first World Cup since 1998 by squeaking out a late draw with an injury-time goal against Algeria. Coach Ralf Rangnick’s team hasn’t won a knockout match at the World Cup since 1954.

“I cannot remember any unforced error they made,” Rangnick said of Spain. “I think they showed us their best performance. I would dare to say we did not only meet the European champions, but possibly the next world champions. If you want to win it, you need to win against Spain. But if we had a lucky punch, we could have had a chance.”