Andres Iniesta’s Heroic World Cup Tribute?!

Many congrats to my Spanish colleagues and friends, you deserved this win. How painful for Holland to lose again: 1974, 1978 and 2010. To referee Howard Webb: Louis van Gaal warned us before the match for your schizo behavior, and he was right. To Andres Iniesta, I salute you for your heroic messaging…

Andres Iniesta scored the 116th-minute goal that gave Spain its first World Cup. By doing so he took the opportunity to pay tribute to a colleague who passed away before the start of last season. In front of a TV audience of more than 750 million people, the Barcelona superstar removed his shirt and revealed this message: “Dani Jarque siempre con nosotros”

The message translates to: “Dani Jarque always with us.” Espanyoldefender Dani Jarque suffered a heart attack before a pre-season game in Italy in 2009.

After the World Cup final, Iniesta explained his gesture: “I wanted to keep Dani with me and with the other teammates. We wanted to pay tribute to him and we thought this was the best opportunity to do so.”

Although I dreamt last nite (about 150 times in the 2 hours I was able to sleep) that Arjen Robben did finish his great opportunity and scored the winning goal. However, this morning I woke-up and thought: if Arjen Robben had scored the winning goal, would he or any of his teammates have done a similar thing?

Would we have showed a witty or selfish message? Or no message at all? We’ll probably never know. What we do know is that Iniesta seized his opportunity and communicated his guerrilla message to + 750 million eyeballs.

And where Howard Webb refused to give Iniesta a yellow or red card when he attacked Mark van Bommel before, Webb did seem to enjoy showing Iniesta the yellow card for taking his shirt off.

But Andres Iniesta, I salute you.

Not only for playing fantastic football during the tournament. Also for your great, unselfish and heroic way to pay tribute to a lost friend- you really rock!!

Howard Webb, I’m sorry- you suck. Bigtime…

To the Dutch team, thanks for a great result. One day….