Lamine Yamal is 19, and he wanted the room to remember it.

Sitting down in front of the press after Spain’s 4-1 win over Croatia on 29 September, the Barcelona forward turned the question on the people asking it.

“A month ago, you were telling me I was sick, that you didn’t know what was wrong with me,” he said. “Now, I’m calm and enjoying myself.”

He was not finished. He described himself as “still improving” and then added a line aimed squarely at the journalists in front of him.

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“After all, you knew me when I was 16.”

Two goals, 61 minutes apart

The match itself was effectively over almost before it started. Yamal opened the scoring inside the second minute at the Estadio Ramón Sánchez-Pizjuán in Seville, Spain’s first home game since lifting the World Cup over the summer.

Croatia equalized through Dion Drena Beljo’s 28th-minute header, but Marc Pubill restored the lead three minutes later from a Yamal cross. In the 63rd minute, Yamal collected a Pedri pass inside the box and drilled his shot in from a tight angle. Substitute Nico Williams rounded off a 4-1 win in the 89th.

Yamal was taken off in the 68th minute to a standing ovation.

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‘They always support us enormously’

Before leaving the stage, Yamal turned to Spain’s supporters.

“They always support us enormously, we are very happy,” he said. “In the end, it is thanks to them that we come here, that we play and that we have fun.”

Spain sit top of UEFA Nations League Group A3 with a perfect record. Luis de la Fuente’s side extended their unbeaten run to 40 matches with the Croatia win, and then stretched it to 41 four days later by beating Czechia 3-1 in Oviedo, with Yamal striking again inside the opening six minutes.

That second result left Spain one point away from a Nations League quarter-final place. Their next international window brings an away trip to Czechia on 12 November and a home match against England three days later.

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