With a performance of breath-taking technical mastery in its Euro 2012 final humbling of Italy, Spain proved this year that it is one of the greatest national teams ever to have graced the game.

The 4-0 victory over the Azzurri in Kiev on July 1 made Vicente del Bosque's side the first team to successfully defend the European crown and the first nation to win three consecutive major international titles.

Beyond the silverware, its stylistic legacy looks set to be remembered with the kind of reverence previously reserved for the Brazilian World Cup winner of 1970 or Rinus Michels' Netherlands side of 1974.