page_title: Tiki-taka
section_title: Notable success
hierarchical_section_title: Tiki-taka / Notable success
caption_attribution_description: Fernando Torres, Iker Casillas, Raúl Albiol and other members of the Spain national football team celebrating Spain's Euro 08 championship
context_page_description: Tiki-taka or Tiqui-taca is a Spanish style of play in football characterised by short passing and movement, working the ball through various channels, and maintaining possession. The style is primarily associated with La Liga club Barcelona, especially during the era of manager Pep Guardiola; however, Guardiola distanced himself from the style stating his view that "I loathe all that passing for the sake of it". Its development and influence goes back to Johan Cruyff's tenure as manager in the early 1990s all the way to the present. Tiki-taka methods were eventually embraced by the Spain national team by the managers Luis Aragonés and Vicente del Bosque. Tiki-taka moves away from the traditional thinking of formations in football to a concept derived from zonal play.
context_section_description: Tiki-taka has been used successfully by the Spain national team, first under Luis Aragonés to win Euro 2008, and subsequently under Vicente del Bosque to win the 2010 World Cup and Euro 2012. It was also used to great success by Barcelona under Pep Guardiola between 2008 and 2012; his team won six trophies in 2009 (including a Continental Treble of La Liga, the Copa del Rey, and the 2008–09 UEFA Champions League, followed by the UEFA Super Cup, the Spanish Super Cup, and the FIFA Club World Cup). The team's attacking, possession-based tiki-taka tactics and 4–3–3 formation also allowed them to win two more consecutive La Liga titles, as well as the 2010–11 UEFA Champions League, among other trophies. While Luis Enrique adopted a faster and more direct tactical approach during his tenure as Barcelona's manager, he also used some similar aspects of tiki-taka, such as an exciting, attacking–minded, possession–based passing game, and building plays from the back on the ground, while instead successfully modifying other elements of his team's gameplay, and abandoning the use of long balls that had characterised Tata Martino's spell with the team. He led Barcelona to a second continental treble during the 2014–15 season, capturing La Liga, the Copa del Rey, and the 2014–15 UEFA Champions League.
  Sid Lowe identifies Luis Aragonés' tempering of tiki-taka with pragmatism as a key factor in Spain's success in Euro 2008. Aragonés used tiki-taka to "protect a defense that appeared suspect [...], maintain possession and dominate games" without taking the style to "evangelical extremes." None of Spain's first six goals in the tournament came from tiki-taka: five came from direct breaks and one from a set play. For Lowe, Spain's success in the 2010 World Cup was evidence of the meeting of two traditions in Spanish football: the "powerful, aggressive, direct" style that earned the silver medal-winning 1920 Antwerp Olympics team the nickname La Furia Roja ("The Red Fury"), and the tiki-taka style of the contemporary Spanish team, which focused on a collective, short-passing, technical and possession-based game.
  Analyzing Spain's semi-final victory over Germany at the 2010 World Cup, Honigstein described the team's tiki-taka style as "the most difficult version of football possible: an uncompromising passing game, coupled with intense, high pressing." For Honigstein, tiki-taka is "a significant upgrade" of Total Football because it relies on ball movement rather than players switching position. Tiki-taka allowed Spain to "control both the ball and the opponent."
  At the 2011 Women's World Cup, the Japan women's national football team (Nadeshiko) employed a form of tiki-taka under coach Norio Sasaki. They upset hosts Germany and the United States to win the tournament.
caption: Spain, European champions in 2008.
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