{"id":571790,"date":"2025-11-15T10:04:14","date_gmt":"2025-11-15T10:04:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/571790\/"},"modified":"2025-11-15T10:04:14","modified_gmt":"2025-11-15T10:04:14","slug":"arsenal-midfielder-not-thinking-about-playing-at-the-world-cup-yet","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/571790\/","title":{"rendered":"Arsenal midfielder not thinking about playing at the World Cup yet"},"content":{"rendered":"

Mart\u00edn Zubimendi says qualification has to come first before he allows himself to think about playing for Spain at the next World Cup.\"LONDON,Photo by Alex Pantling\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Mart\u00edn Zubimendi<\/strong> has made it clear he is not entertaining any thoughts about playing at the World Cup, insisting Spain still have work to do before they can think about the actual tournament.<\/p>\n

Speaking alongside national coach Luis de la Fuente<\/strong>, the midfielder told La Voz de Galicia<\/a>: \u201cI haven\u2019t visualised myself playing a World Cup, just qualifying. We haven\u2019t qualified yet. <\/p>\n

\u201cThis competition has already shown us that, despite doing everything perfect, we still depend on other results.\u201d<\/p>\n

He then stressed the strength of Spain\u2019s squad, saying the group \u201chelps football to come out and flow much better. It makes us stronger.\u201d <\/p>\n

He also highlighted his Arsenal teammate, Mikel Merino<\/strong>, calling his numbers \u201cincredible\u201d. After his brace in Spain\u2019s game against Bulgaria, Merino now has eight goals and an assist in his last eight games for his country<\/p>\n

Looking ahead to Spain\u2019s Georgian opponents, Zubimendi warned that their speed in transition had already caused problems in the reverse fixture. \u201cThey try to play fast after a loss and that put us in difficulties in the previous game. In some situations we did not control it well and it could have taken its toll on us. We have to stay focused.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"BURNLEY,Photo by George Wood\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Spain arrive in Tbilisi with automatic qualification all but sealed but without key figures such as Lamine Yamal<\/strong>, Rodri<\/strong> and Nico Williams<\/strong>. De la Fuente tried to play down the noise surrounding the fixture after a number of withdrawal, saying: \u201cThere are always injuries in football, there are many months left ahead, many demanding matches and we pray that there are no more injuries, although unfortunately there will be.\u201d<\/p>\n

Against a Georgian side coached by Willy Sagnol<\/strong>, who described Spain as \u201cthe best team in the world,\u201d their aim is to avoid qualification going to the final day. With four wins out of four, Spain are three points clear of Turkey <\/strong>at the top of their group with a goal difference that is +12 better than their nearest rivals. <\/p>\n

But Zubimendi\u2019s focus remains unchanged. \u201cAt the moment I don\u2019t see myself in the World Cup, it seems crazy but we still have to qualify.\u201d<\/p>\n

Spain have not lost a game in normal time in 29 matches.<\/p>\n

Related Topics<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mart\u00edn Zubimendi says qualification has to come first before he allows himself to think about playing for Spain…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":571791,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5312],"tags":[2000,299,181454,104],"class_list":{"0":"post-571790","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-spain","8":"tag-eu","9":"tag-europe","10":"tag-martin-zubimendia","11":"tag-spain"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115553151703309806","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571790","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=571790"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/571790\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/571791"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=571790"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=571790"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=571790"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}