Team spirit and dash of luck work for Spain

By Simon Baskett

INNSBRUCK (Reuters) - Thanks to their penalty shootout victory over world champions Italy, Spain are the only one of the Euro 2008 group winners to have made it as far as the semi-finals.

In doing so they have also overcome a quarter-final jinx that stretches back 24 years to the 1984 European Championship.

Spain have traditionally been renowned for having players with neat ball-playing skills and heaps of individual talent, but the team has lacked the killer instinct needed to win the big matches.

An improved team spirit, the ability to control a game and a dash of good fortune appear to have made the difference this time round.

They will now face Russia as they bid to reach their first final since finishing as runners-up to France in 1984.

Russia were Spain's first opponents at Euro 2008, but the match was certainly not the stroll the 4-1 scoreline might suggest and they ended up playing some highly effective counter-attack football almost by accident.

Spain opened the scoring with a David Villa strike that came after a first-time pass from well inside their own half, but then found themselves on the rack against the attack-minded Russians who pinned them back in their own area for much of the first quarter.

Just when Guus Hiddink's side looked as though they might equalise, Spain hit them on the break once again, Villa making it 2-0 with another neat strike.