Spain bid farewell to Euro 2022 feeling angry, frustrated and robbed

“Tomorrow I’ll wake and think: ‘Bloody hell, the Euros have gone.’ It will be a hard day,” Aitana Bonmatí said. It was late in Brighton and Spain had been close, six minutes from a first semi-final, but it was over now. The selección left England earlier than they hoped and earlier than had looked likely when Esther González gave them the lead. Staff said goodbye, some in tears. A plane was hurriedly chartered for the following afternoon. Sad is not really the word, the midfielder said, not after a performance like that. Anger, frustration: those were the words.

The adrenaline was finally subsiding, Bonmatí said, but not entirely: a long time after the end she was still there, still in her kit under the stand, talking about it, taking it in. There was a dissection of the match, the way it had been played. Questions were asked: not just of her, but by her, interest in how others had seen it. There was also pride in the performance and a determination to be back. “I don’t want to leave football without winning a major tournament like this,” she said.

On this evidence she won’t have to. They had been close. And, Spain felt, when it came to the key moment, the decision had gone against them. Bonmatí hadn’t seen a replay of England’s equaliser and hadn’t spoken to the referee, Stéphanie Frappart, after the game either – “there’s no point, you don’t gain anything”. Mariona Caldentey had decided not to say much either. “If I say what I think I’ll probably get banned,” she suggested. “They showed the goal on the screen and there’s an elbow on [Irene] Paredes; you can see is clear foul.”

“The game changes when they scored the first goal and you have seen how they scored it,” Paredes said. “I know 100% that it is a foul. I don’t