Spanish no.1 Iker Casillas and his teammates will feel the pressure of the expectations of their fans when they walk out to meet Germany in the Euro 2008 final in Vienna on Sunday.

The Spanish captain admitted that leading a side with many expectations indeed made him nervous. He said that going into the champion’s league final was very different from entering a European cup final as the European cup had much more spectators and there were many more supporters to please than in the UEFA Champion’s league.

No other team has won the cup with a goalkeeper captain yet. This, and the fact that it has taken Spain 24 years to come to a European final will put considerable pressure on the real Madrid keeper to win the tournament. Casillas himself admits that he is aware of Spain’s horrible record and that he feels pressure more than anyone else, but is confident that Spain can break the horrors of the past and reach towards new glory on Sunday.

Casillas said that Spain had come this long and would like to finish their campaign with a victory in the finals. Their opponents Germany would, meanwhile be playing their sixth European cup final and would be feeling less pressure than the Spanish.

Having captained the side which broke the string of penalty shoot-out losses on their unlucky date (22^nd June), Casillas is not wrong in believing that his team can get through the final barrier. He just has to ensure that he or his teammates make no mistakes on Sunday and use every single opportunity to his side’s advantage.

Spain qualified from group D, and knocked out Russia and Italy on route to the final.