Spain's Sergio Ramos shakes hands with teammate Javi Martinez during the group B World Cup soccer match between Spain and Chile at the Maracana Stadium in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Wednesday, June 18, 2014. Defending champion Spain was eliminated from the World Cup after losing to Chile 2-0. (AP Photo/Frank Augstein)

Foundation of Pep’s philosophy just like PSV rules in Kenya lacked disciples.

Spain’s meek surrender of the Fifa World Cup crown here in Brazil has got pundits signing off the death certificate of Tiki Taka - a style that so tormented the globe over the last six years.

Unknown to most, however, is the fact that the foundations of tiki taka were ever shaky for they rested on the shoulders of former Barcelona coach Pep Guardiola and his late assistant Tito Vilanova and not institutionalised.

Like the Public Service Vehicle rules commonly known as Michuki rules, which flourished on the benign whims of the late Transport minister, tika taka, would not survive Vicente Del Bosque’s reign for he was from a different school of thought.

For any philosophy to gain currency and survive the test of time, it must have staunch proponents and disciples who will water and nourish it.

Writing about Spain’s two X-men, Xavi and Xabi on April 24, 2011 respected columnist of Spanish football, Sid Low, argued: “These are Madrid and Barcelona’s cerebros: their brains.”

He described Xavi Hernandez as, Barcelona’s ideologue – bright, opinionated and analytical, the man Pep Guardiola told: “I can’t imagine Barça without you.”

At Brazil 2014 Spain’s supposed brain, Xavi, had his role limited by Del Bosque’s philosophical grounding.

In comparing Xavi and Xabi, Lowe posited that because Xabi is taller, more imposing, his position is a little more static, a little deeper while Xavi provides the final pass more often and Spain’s most important assist provider. Xabi’s passes travel further; Xavi’s travel faster.

Well, Guardiola understood Xavi’s potential probably because he was central in developing the tiki taka philosophy in La Masia where most, if not all, of the Barcelona players came from.

The problem for Spain and Barcelona is no effort was made to recruit staunch proponents of this style. What they have in Xavi and his Barcelona teammates are just exponents, but who of course have suffered the vagaries of ageing, exhaustion and declining hunger for success.

By winning the World Cup in 2010 and the Euro in 2012, a lot of praise was heaped on Del Bosque, the arch-inheritor, instead of the late Luis Arragones.

What the pundits forget is that Aragones, did sow the seed of the current Atletico Madrid side.

In contrast, the style of Real Madrid of Del Bosque in the early 2000s, is one we see in most teams now destroying Spain, the style Sid Lowe describes as teams which, “rather than endlessly circulating possession in a manner that prompts some critics of tiki-taka to brand it ‘boring’, they are counter-punchers who rely on breathless industry and water-tight defensive organisation.”

In fact, to put this in the context of Michuki rules, it is where anything goes including aggression on the road provided there is ugali on the table in the evening. If Michuki’s rules had been founded on proper policy, where it does not matter who is in charge, then there would be order on our roads.

At the moment, there is no order in Spain’s tiki taka, in fact, it has mutated into taka taka (rubbish).

Today, Del Bosque does not know what to make of the cerebros; Xavi and Xabi.  Well, tiki taka may not be dead but has gone into hibernation. May be it will take Guardiola’s return to Spain to re-order the sense of tiki taka or if Xavi goes to management upon retirement.