Known for rockin' microphones & twistin' off 40 tops.
It may surprise no one that there are pictures -- just like the above left -- of a lil' Don Rodriguez still floating around his moms' crib which may or may not involve an afro, an Ocean Pacific hat, and a can of Dos Equis. The operative word is, "Word."
If only this was the picture you got Google Earthing Chile-Brazil. [It's Chile.]
Welcome to what will hopefully become a semi-regular offering by Don Rodriguez -- that is, if friends and colleagues are as generous with their time and their words as is today's guest. We are lucky to have an actual Ghost, or Gosfais, a.k.a. Daniel Corry, as Ghostwriter today. Being that Brazil plays Chile in a friendly match this Saturday, Don asked his good friend, who lived in Chile in 2000-2001 and now lives in Brazil, to share some of his thoughts on the matter. Enjoy!
Why Chile could win (more old information)
Also during the year I was in Chile, the Olympics were in Australia, and Chile there made an extraordinary run to the semifinals or finals. The games were broadcast at 4 in the morning and I remember my drinking train ran right through their win over Nigeria -- I actually couldn’t see the TV and later vomited on a wall -- it was Jota, red wine and Coca Cola. If I am the first person to name Jota as perhaps the metaphor for Chilean geopolitics, you can just mail me the diploma.
An Olympic squad is an under-23 team with only two golden oldies allowed, so that showing should bode well for the current Chilean squad, though they of course didn’t qualify for the last World Cup. That bronze medal team had old Zamorano, who around then began the standard Latin American retirement procedure by moving from Milan to Mexico, and whose place in the high-middle of world soccer strikers no Chilean has assumed since. I think that Chile might have some 17 year-old who was bought by an AC Milan or something and who is probably on their youth team still, maybe he will play. Who knows?
Why Brazil could lose
Their coach was ‘disappeared’ after the cup. I read the paper the day the new one was hired and several prominent and agéd members of Brazil’s football pantheon expressed supreme befuddlement at the choice of Dunga, a player to be seen in ’94 highlights and whose ears gave him his ‘nick,’ as Snow White’s Dopey [= Dunga (dubbed)]. Worse, recently Brazil lost to Portugal which is annoying and incestuous thanks to the fact that the best coach in the world is a different Brazilian, Filipão, maestro behind the 2002 win and several Brazilian club dream seasons and who has permanently lifted Portugal up above their own level.
After Filipão beat the Brazilians he was asked about Dunga, and said, ‘Dunga is doing what he has to, trying out new players and giving everyone a chance.’ I assume this is the truth. More importantly, imagine being the new coach and losing to a guy who is so made, who carries his steak-belly like a trophy, who was offered your job but declined, and then reading in the paper his evaluation of your coaching. I am sure nobody asked Dunga what he thought of the job Filipão is doing with Portugal -- why would they? That seems to sum up where Brazil is right now -- a low point in the cycle of empire, overshadowed by the feats the past.
A player:
Maybe this guy Sobis will play forward. He made his fame just as I arrived here, scoring twice to win the Copa Libertadores finals and subsequently moving to Betis in Spain. He is a little wiry blonde guy with a Latin mullet never to be mistaken for the prancing gel-job of a Swede, and I have the feeling that he is the medieval type of player who is playing on the Selecão right now but will be lucky to be on the renaissanced bench of the next World Cup.
In his scrubby way he reminds me of a Chilean. Right now in Brazil a gente não ta nem ae. Not even caring. We will let the team get better on its own and come back to us when it’s presentable.
Chili? C'mon!
Welcome to what will hopefully become a semi-regular offering by Don Rodriguez -- that is, if friends and colleagues are as generous with their time and their words as is today's guest. We are lucky to have an actual Ghost, or Gosfais, a.k.a. Daniel Corry, as Ghostwriter today. Being that Brazil plays Chile in a friendly match this Saturday, Don asked his good friend, who lived in Chile in 2000-2001 and now lives in Brazil, to share some of his thoughts on the matter. Enjoy!
Part II, coming soon!
Why Chile could win
The last time Chile beat Brazil, I suppose, was when I was there, meaning Chile, in 2000. Nobody watched it on TV since it was the first game in the qualifying round of the 2002 World Cup that no one thought they would make, and ultimately didn’t. I have a small memory of the slow motion 1-0 winner and the Chilean announcer screaming that they had beaten the best in the world. But the wild hope that was subsequently sparked and fueled by few good results over lesser countries had already died out when Argentina came to town months later. I watched from the bleachers and the Chileans looked like Cocker Spaniels nipping at the heels of German Shepherds. There was one bald striker in sky blue and white that was almost certainly the spawn of fled war criminals, and he scored to end it 3-0. Of course, there was constant threatening of the fully armored police, this in the form of teenagers shaking and climbing to the top of the fence around the field where on the other side cops waited with machine guns.
Got Benjy lookin' all googly-eyed and silly.
It is a poorly disguised internet secret that posting pictures of Cristiano Ronaldo on your blog rockets up hit counts significantly. [A brief shout to all the ladies out there Google-image-checking for "the Boy" as Sir Alex so often calls him: Hello, ladies.] Internet, your spot is blown.
It is also poorly disguised secret amongst fans of Manchester United that their own decrying of the sartorial excesses and fortunate bone-structure of its current and fleet-of-foot Portuguese Number Seven are desperate attempts to deflect attention from the childlike (okay, girlish) pride they feel when dude runs 70 yards past everyone on the other team and then scores. Or does this. Gary Neville, your spot is blown.
B/T/W, "cheers" to C.R., whose English -- while not great enough to avoid the awkwardness of of recently referring to oneself in the third person in a language one is still unfamiliar with -- was good enough for this bit of dry humor [taken from the Vogue article where the pictures above appeared]:
"According to the newspapers I have 20 girlfriends, but I have only met two or three of them."
We don't give a fruck it's not your birthday.
I'm rushing to write this because Romario might score his 1,000th career goal any minute now.
Or not, depending on who you believe.
Strikers in football keep multiple goal tallies. There's the league total, the goals scored in cup competitions, then the goals scored in all competitions number (Elite forwards in 2007 are expected -- though they might rarely fulfill those wishes -- to score 40-50 goals in all competitions in a season). Then, there is The Romario Number, a.k.a. all goals in all competitions in every competitive endeavor since toddlerhood.
This is the issue: Romario, aged 41, nicknamed "Shorty," is currently on 998 goals for his career. By his count. 70-100 or so of those goals were scored either as a teenager, an amateur player, and some even in scrimmages and unofficial matches, some against weekend-league level competition. (Though I hate the American-writing-about-soccer-tic to equate everything with baseball or whatever, just think whether or not you'd have a problem with Barry Bonds including all the homers he hit for touchdowns in the third period, down 40-love, when he was in Little League and at Sunday Beer League Softball). Here are some facts, almost all of them are funny:
Born in a Rio slum, Romario is the supreme Carioca, who expresses his patriotism partly by buying the city's real estate. Outside Rio his oddities are less appreciated. "In Sao Paulo," growls a Paulista, "he is regarded practically as an Argentinian." Romario is that characteristic Rio type, the malandro: a chancer, a fun-lover, a rule-breaker.And don't forget, Jorge Ben, "Se Segura, Malandro"
At 22 he left home to join PSV Eindhoven. A malandro and the Dutch workplace were not an ideal combination. Here was a man whose hobby was sleeping (14 hours a day); who said his team-mates could not play; who flew home to Rio at will, fixtures or not; who liked nightlife so much he intended "to keep going out until I am 90 years old". In games he rarely moved, yet averaged nearly a goal a game.
He treated his European years as an exile, a strictly money-making exercise: "In Holland I work; I live in Rio." He failed to comprehend the Dutch habit of turning up for appointments or the way they expected great footballers to obey rules, though he did appreciate Dutch girls.
But he always scored, and eventually Barcelona signed him. Even at the giant club he remained blase. Guus Hiddink, once his manager at PSV, remembers visiting Barcelona as coach of Valencia. Romario was about to kick off the match in front of 100,000 spectators when he suddenly told the referee to hang on, jogged to Valencia's bench and kissed Hiddink on both cheeks. To Romario, the match was just decor, with him the only character. In an increasingly corporate sport, his selfishness was almost heroic.
No más.
The NY Times deigns to cover soccer in a half-page or so, buried deep within the Sports section every Tuesday thereabouts; this interview with Barcelona and Cameroon striker Samuel Eto'o was a weekend rarity.
Eto'o is a fantastic player, and one with principles. As the interview mentions, Eto'o was subjected to racist chanting throughout a match in Zaragoza last year, and threatened to -- and almost did -- walk off the pitch before the end of the match (The congenial Ronaldinho helped convince him to finish it out). I'm still rather torn as to whether he should have continued or not. One one hand, I would have liked to have seen the effect the walkout would have had on the match, the league, and the country -- which doesn't have the best reputation for tolerance -- (it's quite poor, actually -- Wikipedia writes the following sentence with a straight face: "Referee Fernando Carmona Mendez did not mention the incidents in his match report, commenting only that the behaviour of the crowd was 'normal'."). Yet, I'm also glad that, in a way, he didn't allow the racists in attendance to have the final say and force him out of the stadium.
You can see Eto'o near the end of this video pointing at the skin of the Zaragoza player Alvaro -- who I believe is Brazilian -- while gesturing at the crowd, seemingly urging them to acknowledge that, "Yes, you have a black man playing for your side as well."
This has always meant little to racist fans. What first fascinated me about this subject was the fact that some teams' fans will throw bananas and the like not merely at the opposing side's black players, but sometimes their own. Which offends in every possible conception.
But back to the interview. I'm all for Jack Bell making minor-to-colossal errors in all future interviews, because that was certainly the most entertaining answer in what was generally a rather dry Q & A. Not hating. Just saying.
"I am the Ooh Child."
There are few people who I'm happier about getting press and success these days than Tracy Morgan.
I hate for this to be one of those "I remember when dude was...[insert self-aggrandizing story about how you recognized current star's genius as a bit player on some short-lived TV show]" posts, but...
I remember grammar school weekends of staying up late to watch Saturday Night Live in its entirety so that I'd still be awake for Uptown Comedy Club, which played right after SNL -- opposite "Showtime at the Apollo" -- on Fox (which I think was still just Channel 5 or WNEW or something in NYC). The Big Thing then was kids who wanted to entertain at the lunch table the next week would competitively memorize as much of the sketches as possible, then when recounting them got beat, just use the funniest bits as code/cool/buzz words to exclude/belittle those who hadn't watched that weekend, and were thus doubly not in on the joke. Real terrible-type kid shit.
So sure, I watched for Hartman, Farley, Myers, Rock, and Sandler (this was early 90's, decadent-crest-before-precipitous-crash era) to pass with all the white kids, etc., etc. Suppose it's hard to hate on "Matt Foley" really.
But me and my boy Lu (who, despite the theme of this post, was not Dominican, but Colombian) would commiserate outside during after-lunch recess, obviously after throwing the ol' foil ball around a bit, and talk "Biscuit."
Biscuit was one of the characters Morgan used to play (allegedly because he was "a biscuit away from 300 pounds") in sketches, and occasionally during the concluding segment, which was a round of the dozens (a.k.a that Wilmer Valderrama show, but funny) featuring some of the cast. This was also when "snapping" was huge; like the writing-about-the-Arcade-Fire of its day.
In character, Tracy Morgan used to wear a beanie with a propeller.
WATCH: Tracy Morgan on Uptown Comedy Club (though he actually loses this battle, which was very rare.)
So Lu and I would snap on each other's mothers pretending that we weren't using the same ish we just heard the weekend previous, and still go buckwild when one of us busted out the A-game lines.
Suffice it to say I was geeked when TM finally made SNL, since it sort of felt like we -- me and Tracy, that is -- made the big time after toiling "together" in the dregs of Saturday late-nite TV. And dude killed it, all the while somehow still on the low.
WATCH: Tracy Morgan, as Brian Fellow, threaten to kill a parrot
Somewhere between SNL and now, Morgan did a few hilarious spots for ESPN video games, the best of which featured Ben Wallace and Jeremy Roenick (which brings me back as well since Roenick-as-gaming-entity was too a huge part of my grammar school youth)
WATCH: Tracy Morgan achieve the iso-motion on Ben Wallace
WATCH: Tracy Morgan melt this ice
And now that he's the livest wire on 30 Rock and blowing up the spot on every late-nite talk show (and some early-morning ones too if you check the link roll to your right), I think the boy deserves his due.
WATCH: Tracy Morgan on Letterman
WATCH: Tracy Morgan in "Blackass" (parodying Jackass for The Jimmy Kimmel Show)
Just to bring the whole self-aggrandizement theme home as well, this clip from the '06 VH1 film Totally Awesome -- which I have not seen, though if Morgan is as good in every scene as he is here, I just may have to -- is hilarious not just for the karate-chop-beatbox-scale (you'll see), or even for the coining of the term "sweatpants money," (!!!) but also b/c TM namechecks the Decepticons, an infamous gang about which anyone who grew up 'round NYC in the 80s would have undoubtedly heard.
[Additionally, there's probably about 30-40 minutes worth of dude's stand-up on YouTube that I'm not about to post. Yet. In the meantime, just looking at the list of people he's impersonated is funny]
P.S. This was undoubtedly my most Tom Breihan post ever. It's all love, T-Bone.
"...its crashes are singularly horrific."
In honor of the impending arrival of one German whom I suspect may brag about how fast he can get from Hamburg to Berlin (in his mutter's Porsche, no less), I direct your attention to this Times piece from today.
Okay, and maybe for this obvious, but obviously irresistible line:
"Car connoisseurs from around the world flock to Pfaffenhausen, a one-horse town where the local company, Ruf Automobile, makes cars with many horses."Sounds like a variant on a soon-to-be written Juelz Santana lyric.
Where all the work at.
There is a rather elastic term of which I'm particularly fond that the English use to describe the occasional disagreement, tiff, to-do, row, etc. (Note: While I'm at it, I'm also a fan of "rowing," which sounds like "outing" -- the gerund verb form of "row" often used by The Streets and assorted other louts).
That term is "handbags."
It gets applied rather liberally. For instance, you can describe two gents facing up against one another as "a bit of handbags," you might descibe their punch-feints themselves as "handbags," or, "Oh, and now the ref's got to sort through these handbags." (Okay, maybe that last one's a lie.) Often employed by commentators in those (quite common) instances after a mistimed tackle where the offended player has something extra to say to the forehead of his offender, the term seems particularly well-suited for footballers, who seem to prefer Eskimo-kissing to swinging on each other.
Except for Valencia's David Navarro. But that's another story.
(WATCH: David Navarro break a man's nose, then run like a bitch.)
There might not be a better word than handbags -- unless we consult our French-English Slang Dictionary -- to describe the latest verbal joust in which Arsenal manager Arsene Wenger has chosen to engage himself.
A few days earlier, Wenger had this to say about the injury woes of his and France's star striker, Thierry Henry:
“I feel Thierry has been badly managed by the French national team. The World Cup Final was on the July 9, and I gave him a holiday until August 4. Then he came back and we prepared him. I left him out of the Champions League qualifier against Dinamo Zagreb. They [France] called him up for a game on August 16 - less than 14 days after he came back [from Germany] - and they played him for a whole game against Bosnia. After the World Cup final, why did they need to do that?”Today, France coach Raymond Domenech (whose Wiki is both interesting and hilarious) responded:
“I’m seriously starting to get tired of Mr. Wenger. [Wenger] does not know everything and is not the only one with the right to exist in football. Even [UEFA president] Michel Platini has noted that his remarks were stupid. [Wenger] is saying that a match in August can explain an injury in March. But it has to be known that every time Henry has played for France, he was playing for Arsenal three days later.”My interest is piqued not merely because they're French, and when I hear "handbags" I may or may not envision two Enlightenment philosophes wielding handbags, intelligently bruising each other, leaving puffs of wig powder in their wake. Such a situation would surely require each man to slap the other gently, yet firmly about each cheek with an elbow-length velvet glove before the succeeding event could take place. This clearly has not transpired between Wenger and Domenech.
Don't call it one.
Could it be I've stayed away too long?
I've missed so many things over the past few, but this most especially. Not promising drops on the daily, but certainly with more regularity. Apologies to those who've put up with proto-blog-posts-as-group-emails, which were only occasionally funny, possibly offensive, surely annoying. All football-related obsessiveness has once again found a home, albeit with a new name.
Topics you may encounter here, perhaps with photo accompaniment:
Scoundrels + last refuge for one
Step To, Step To
Nigh time to remove "Coup de Boule" from your empeethree device, it is. Weltmeisterschafts, Mundials, Copas -- all over. Weeks have past. Legacies have been brutally burnished. Children have been apologized to. Frenchmen have unashamedly reinforced their nation's greatest musical cliches. (Marco Materazzi: Not dead...yet.) Cristiano Ronaldo had sex with the Queen of England, winked at the bitch, then got her sent off. Gary Neville was disappointed with him. Italy got relegated. Jose Mourinho got a haircut (more on that...later).
Most importantly, lovers got married.
But you're right...It's been a long time. We shouldn't have left you.
Without a dope link to Zidane's homepage. Still feelin ya, homie.
Dear Zizou,
I'll be forever fascinated by this moment. As a matter of fact, I can't stop watching it. The moment, the movement, is breathtaking, and not simply because I feel emptiness in my chest every single time I see it.
You made a choice. You chose tragedy, or something like it, over glory. A conscious, rational, and direct choice -- I believe that. And I have to believe there's a reason for that, and one that you are free to share or keep for yourself. There was venom in that blow, but also conviction; no doubt to your savage motion. Which is why I respect your choice like I respect any other. This does not excuse your action -- nor explain it fully (and, like your reasons for playing your last World Cup, we may never truly know, "Why?") -- but defines it as something freely elected, and not the "moment of madness" that many have deemed it. You may regret the chance to finish your career with your hands wrapped around Jules Rimet's trophy, perhaps also the sorrow of your fellow players at having lost a chance to celebrate as champions, but I suspect that you do not regret what you did.
(By the way, have you read A Happy Death? You may know its author.)
And what did you do? Only the most cold-blooded thing I've ever seen, either in football or elsewhere. A head-butt to the chest. Excuse me? On the world's biggest stage, with billions watching, and watching you -- the most famous man on the pitch and the best player this generation has ever seen -- in a World Cup Final that was yours (and your alone) to win. This was no Figo-esque forehead bump. Those are exchanged all the time, with no ill effect. No, you lowered your head and sprang forward with what seemed like incredible force into the chest of another man. The execution was flawless -- as expert as your free kick to Henry against Brazil, your chipped penalty to go up 1-0, even that supernatural Champions League volley against Bayer Leverkusen in 2002 -- could anyone have imagined a headbutt delivered more correctly, with more power, and with more accuracy, than that? I say again, who else, who else could have done that?
And you laughed a little before you did it.
Luis Felipe Scolari said an incredible thing about you. Something to the effect of: "[And I'm paraphrasing wildly... - Ed.] Zidane has a certain capacity to mesmerize all who watch him, fans and players alike. This quality is so unique and so magical that even those opposing players who are beaten by him with the ball still can take a kind of pleasure from it. The ball never cries when it is at is feet [100%, Scolari said that last sentence, no joke - Ed]."
And you can see it here too. Materazzi, whatever he said or did, was trying to provoke a reaction (And whenever we find out, of course it will not be enough to justify it in our minds...maybe). But who could have expected that? Lulled to sleep after slipping in perhaps the first or the tenth of unspeakable slurs, Marco walked right into that one. Pow. Delivered correctly, that kind of blow can kill a man. And I suspect that some part of you just may have been trying to kill Signore Materazzi. (How is he still alive, b/t/w?) Who knows, it may still happen. Sorcery, especially yours, works in mysterious ways. Don't be surprised if M.M. doesn't wake up tomorrow.
What amazes me most of all, however, is that you have managed, even in infamy, to do something so totally unexpected, so otherworldy, so incredible (in every sense of the word) that it makes the mystique that surrounds you even greater. This was absolutely stunning. Bizarrely glamorous in the same way as Cantona's famous Kung-Fu kick, you've somehow made the brutal beautiful. Violence and vengeance are and have always been sexy, but that move --- it's much, much more important than that.
Unless you tell us, one can never be sure exactly what was said, though it would be difficult to believe it had nothing to do with your parents and their nation of origin (No men of any deeper shades that I know think differently). It certainly wasn't the first time you'd heard something similar, and similarly reprehensible. Public figures from "France" have nearly said the same. If so, then was this you striking a blow for all those slurred against? For the Samuel Eto'os and Thierry Henrys of the world? I'd like to believe that, but perhaps I'm a bit overzealous here. You tell me (Please?) Or was it something more personal? Maybe you just didn't want to trade jerseys with anybody after the match. Ensure that your final jersey was yours and no one else's. It's a joke, it's a joke.
But a sacrifice, maybe? A point made with the crown of the head at the expense of a world championship? Is that worth more to you than any Golden Ball? Was that pure emotion, distilled into one unforgettable motion, more satisfying than lifting some weirdly shaped metal objet? Should we prize that instead? Even if it's rage? Who knows? Whatever was waiting for you down in that tunnel, past the Jules Rimet (in the saddest shot ever captured on sport cameras) is yours, and not for me nor anyone to judge.
Here are things that I hope do not happen, but are surely being thought and written in these next days, weeks, and years. That the "mean-streets-of-Marseilles/wrong-side-of-the-tracks" talk will be used as pretext to define you as a lost cause, a failed hero, a tarnished star. That it is in the nature of those who grew up as you did to revert to their upbringing. One can say this any number of ways: 'Once from the projects, always from the projects.' Which is another way to say even more despicable things. These ideas are even more insidious, more dangerous than any headbutt you could ever deliver.
But in a strange way, I think you've won. And I think you know this. What is it that people will remember about this World Cup, about this game? That Italy won? Maybe. Italians will certainly remember that. But the world will remember you. And that Italy won only because you were not there. That's a certain type of genius. Maybe evil, but genius. And the fact that you would never become a Maradona, a Beckenbauer, even a Platini -- an "ambassador for the game" as they are wont to say, only makes your decision, your action, stand further in relief: perhaps the last, forceful statement from the shyest wizard in the world. A retreat into legend and La Castellane. After all, you're 45th generation Carthaginian. Who did those guys play against again?
You have always been the most unknowable of footballers, of people even. You defined elegance and all synonyms thereof, as much as you did the word 'inscrutable'. I started out by saying that you made a choice, and I think I'm right. People, including me, have thought of you as having alien qualities. Here I think I'm wrong. Maybe you just chose to be human. Who could be mad at that?
Sincerely,
PLO
P.S.- This guy is an idiot. A blithering idiot. "Dumb, dumb, dumb." You can tell him I said so, but apparently he's heard it already. But I'm sure he's never heard what you have.
You're with this, right?
So what you've seen people live-blog that great shit they took last night. This is the World Cup Final. You're gonna love it.
After all the Fan Miles, beach clubs, corner cafes, and fifth-row seats, we're gonna do this one like some honest-to-goodness football intellectuals: At home, in front of a warm, crackling television. No distractions but for the MacBook and maintaining regular breathing. Italy v. France. Let's go...
7:30pm - Il Divo and Toni Braxton sing 'the official World Cup song, "The Time of Our Lives."' This is news to me. I can name you three other songs offhand, all slightly terrible, played about 5000 times more frequently than this one, which I've never heard before. Anyway, Il Divo. My mom loves these guys. My mom loves Paolo Maldini too, but I'm not sure if he can sing. Whatever, Maldini's nickname should be "Il Divo." Do you think they form like an operatic Voltron or some shit? And at the very least, Toni kept her six yard box on the low this time.
7:40pm - Wyclef and Shakira perform "Hips Don't Lie." Also news to me. Always thought the eyes were the giveaway when it came to half-truths, but I'm a be staring at pelvises from now on. Oh, and Wyclef rapped these words: "I'm a student of Pele/ Call me Pele Player." That's all. He said that. The Haiti wifey is hot though, we'll give him that. But still, the most physically demanding/impossible move I've seen in this entire World Cup is that breast-popping thing that Shakira does, and with the greatest of ease. I'm concerned for her vertebral alignment.
7:50 - The boy walking out with Zidane just coughed into the hand he's about to hold Zizou's with. Conspiracy? An Arsenal fan? No, they'd root for the French. Italian conspiracy? That's redundant.
7:52 - The players walk out onto the field. Flashes pop. Like a kid, I'm still amazed at what 60,000+ flashbulbs look like. Wonder when that first became a phenomenon?
7:53 - Italian national anthem. Gattuso singing hard, Buffon too. Materazzi's a hack, even while singing. I can still remember his dopey face after fouling a Bulgarian for a penalty in Euro 2004 to put Italy down a goal.
7:55 - French national anthem. Viera's meditating. Zidane is wearing what a neutral might call the most badass face ever. Looks just killed 37 elderly Italian men in Treviso.
7:56 - Also, something I forgot to note during Ukraine v. Italy. Italian fans seem to love "Seven Nation Army." (Can someone out there explain?) I always thought Italy was composed out of fourteen or so separate principalities united sometime in the 1870s, but maybe I'm wrong. I'm wrong.
7:57 - Zidane's all business. He barely shook Cannavaro's hand during the customary exchange of banners.
8:00 - Kick-off. Whaddya expect? The stereotype of German preciseness -- fallacious when it comes to the trains, for real -- is sometimes deserved.
1st minute - Henry goes down. Knocked heads with Cannavaro. Looks really dazed. Spaniards -- including Carlos Puyol --around the world smile, then choke back tears. Karma is a bitch, and so are phantom blows to the face that land a few weeks later.
3.40 - Henry's back. Funny shot of him recoiling from smelling salts.
4.30 - Zambrotta receives yellow card.
5:20 - PENALTY!!! Of course it's Materazzi!!! Hackish tendencies always reveal themselves in big games. I'd been waiting for him to do something dumb and was actually expecting/predicted it to happen against Germany, but I suppose he decided to save it until the grandest stage was set. When you fuck up, do it spectacularly.
12:35 - So the French were set up with a nice early penalty, early goal. One hopes the rest of the match won't settle into the waste that was the portion of the Portugal-France game which didn't include Fabien Barthez playing co-ed beach volleyball with Cristiano Ronaldo's freekick. B/T/W, very little happened these last 7 or so minutes.
18:45 - GOAL! Materrazzi!. The dope makes up for it. The streets are insane. Honestly. I'm looking at them. Firecrackers, um, crack outside. This will be a great game. Materazzi: at least dude makes every game interesting.
23:00 - "Ohhh oh-oh-oh-oh-ohhhh-ohhhh...."
24:22 - I can hear a thousand echoes of the commentary around me, from streets hundreds of meters away. I don't even have to turn my volume up, in fact. The entire city is watching this game. I've heard cheers, gasps, and shouts from my terrace before, but none ever this loud. Even tackles get cheered. It's almost overwhelming how loud it can be, thi sound emanating from everywhere and nowhere. Like some sort or weird inchoate organic being, the city has become a chorus of audible emotion.
26:43 - My feed is a non-digital TV feed, therefore eveyone watching outdoors at a cafe on a rear-projection screen is on about a three-second delay, which makes for amusingly delayed reactions and good guessing games as to where the shouts will come from.
27:15 - Hard header again from Materazzi that beat Barthez but was cleared by Thuram. Doesn't matter. Foul.
28:22 - It's 8:28pm and it's so bright, calm, cool, and blue outside that it could be 4pm on a lazy sunday afternoon in NY. Absolutely perfect weather. Fracesco Totti takes an unsuccessful freekick.
30:20 - Malouda takes a weak shot right at Buffon. Cameras show Beckenbauer, again at a match, as if he would miss the Final. Watched him in his helicopter earlier today during a wrapup show of Germany's progress through the W.C. What does he drink for all that energy? I hope it's Sparks.
32:54 - Zidane and Vieira talk, as animatedly as these two could ever do (which is not very) while Simone Perrotta writhes on the field. That's right guys, sprinkle some water on it. He'll be fine.
34:20 - Zidane just chipped a genius ball up for Henry that the Italians dealt with poorly -- anyway it's out of the zone for a foul.
35:00 - Toni, attacking for Italy, has the ball tackled away from him at the last moment. Corner...
35:15 - Toni hits it off the bar!
36:06 - Down on the other end, Henry has the ball tackled away from him as he ran towards the end line , which allows me to figure something out. Only Italians could cheer so loud for fine defensive play, which you'll get a lot of with Cannavaro.
40:15 - A plane flies by overhead, in descent. Who the hell would be on a flight right now? Where could they be coming from? Playing tennis on the moon, one hopes.
41:25 - I can hear "Allez Les Bleus" drifting in off the strong breeze coming from the south. Poetically, it would be coming all the way from the Fan Mile at Brandenburger Tor, a few miles away. Maybe it's just coming from the French bar 4 blocks down.
43:41 - Someone's piping in an Italian feed as I hear "Grosso, Grosso, calcio da angolo."
44:24 - Totti takes a freekick that's headed hard away from goal. Looks like both teams might be happy to head in locked at 1-1, but of course me saying that means Franck Ribery will score with his fascinating face (not his head) before the whistle blows.
HALFTIME 1-1. "Das Finale! Italien gegen Frankreich." Buffaloans will be glad to know that France is "Frankreich" in German, just like their QB circa -- oh who gives a shit -- Frank Reich. Ribery still amazing to look at. Didn't score though.
One Tenor, singing. Applause.
8:50 - The sun is only just setting here as Gerhard Delling and Gunter Netzer's voices echo throughout Prenzlauer Berg. The sky is pink, blue, and orange.
9:02pm - Players gather in tunnel.
9:04pm - KICKOFF, 2nd half
45:30 - "Eine klassik Henry situation," says the German announcer. Henry sped into the box and got a shot off, but Buffon saved.
49:25 - Henry: balletic. Like a skater on ice, really (Cheers, Martin Tyler). Henry spins off a defender's challenge, steals into the box and crosses...and the cross is cleared, dangerously, near the Italian goal by the Azzurri. Looks like Henry put his Arsenal Underoos on today.
51:35 -Henry gets the ball in the box and waits an age to do something, as if it were 90 mins against Blackburn and he were on the sideline, wasting time.
52:40 - Zidane! For Malouda! He goes down in the box, but the ref is demanding he stand up. No penalty, not this time.
53:45 - Another plane. I mean, really.
54:00 - Malouda along the end line...for Ribery...but it is too much behind him. [Euro-English syntax - Ed.] Berlin sighs.
56:05 - Oh shit. Vieira just came off for Alou Diarra. Injured. The tears must be streaming by now, even for a dude as hard as the Senegalese-born Vieira. Zidane's still playing though.
57:23 - Did the announcer just talk shit for Ribery? He said the German words for "excuse me" when Ribery beat the Italian defender to the line. Just like an And 1 mixtape, for sure.
58:21 - Zidane adjusts his armband. Like my man Dactile says: Can't they find some space age material to keep them suckers up? Nah, it's too much fun to adjust them, being captain and all.
58:29 - German announcer just named the aplayers available from the Italian bench. De rossi can play, his 4 match ban over. And here's De Rossi right now, for Perrotta Also, Totti steps off.. The Minotaur awaits...
65:16 - Toni SCORES from the freekick, but they were clearly offside.
62:45 - "Henry, gegen Cannavaro..." Shoots...saved by Buffon.
63:00 - Toni on the other end...blocked.
64:50 - Zidane just dummied the fuck out of Gattuso.
66:19 - The Blue Hour is just beginning in Berlin. It's much like it sounds, but then again, what good is sound to express the calmed color of the sky right now. "German Dusk," just much better named.
70:00 - Zidane's not going to get a chance to score a textbook World Cup-winning header if he keeps taking these long free kicks. Although that last one to Henry turned out pretty well...
72:55 - Hey, this Teamgeist ball is more golden than the rest! Awesome! But does it like Asians?
75:50 - Yellow card for Diarra. Pirlo to take freekick for Italy.
76:50 - "PIRLO!" Just missed.
79:30 - Did Zidane just make the "make a change motion?" Did he just dislocate his shoulder? Nah, looks like he can move it as he gets up, without the need for a stretcher. He's back on. Berlin cheers.
82:40 - The city awaits the corner, which is cleared.
83:13 - Offsides on Malouda as he tried to steal in on the left side of the Italian defense.
83:50 - Gattuso: Professionally beastly foul from him in central midfield.
84:46 - The French have been having the run of play for the last 10 minutes, but there's a strange feeling in the air, maybe it's all the blue, that makes me think the Italians have another final few minutes of sustained barrage planned as in the Germany match.
85.57 - Del Piero on for Camoranesi. That's the man to perform said surgical strike (if there is to be one), introduced by Lippi.
87:20 - Dive from de Rossi, inconsequential foul called on Diarra.
88:00 - Iaquinta? When did he come on?
89:40 - Heyyyy! Palpable tension! Great!
90:00 - The cheers from the streets are amazing. Volumes are turned up on blast everywhere. Italian, German, French. A chorus of names: Zidane! Ribery! Other awesome ones!
After 1:55 seconds of injury time, the whistle to end regulation blows. Extra time to come.
90:01 - KICKOFF. Okay, so the gold on the ball matches the gold on Zidane's boots. Nice, one, Adidas. So clearly Zidane will win this one, with something mystical. Matter of fact I saw Domenech telling Zidane right before kickoff to "kick that old Champions League 2002 shit. Heads ain't ready for that, *gar*-son." Sorry.
94:25 - Malouda breaks in but is blocked off by Gattuso, who took a knock (?)
97:50 - HENRY...just sprinting past Italians. Only just misses the correct ball out to the wing.
99:00 - RIBERY!!! The prettiest play of the game ends in a shot just wide of the far post from Ribery. And that's gonna be all for Scarface. He's been great. Trzeguet will get his chance to equal his previous feat of scoring in extra time to win a major tournemnt against Italy (see Euro 2000).
101:10 - Zidane calling for the ball in the midfield. Just great. I'm telling you, he wants it.
101:59 - Zidane measures up a cross for Henry, same axis as the Brazil-beating goal. Caught by Buffon.
103:03 - ZIDAAANE!!! Saved with the right hand of Renaissance Buffon. Incredibly strong header, directed right underneath the crossbar. Saved the game, Gianluigi did. Zidane: primal scream. Kind of frightening, actually.
End of first period, still blue, just deeper.
Please, no penalties.
On we go.
105:36 - What do we have here? De Rossi taking an elbow to the head. Poetic justice is sucking itself off.
106:32 - What the Fuck? Henry for WILTORD? France have lost. Zidane really will have to do it all alone. Henry is crushed, and injured, or just wiped. Not to mention the psychic scars of being substituted for Wiltord.
108:15 - Great. Which Italian is writhing about the pitch now?
Ummm, holy fuck. Zidane should be red carded. WTF was that? He just HEADBUTTED Materazzi IN THE CHEST. Did they possibly miss that? If so, this man is a true magician. Nope, he's going to be sent off. The world is falling apart. It's getting too dark to see my keys, and Zidane just tried to knock Marco Materazzi through Heaven's Door. Terrible, yes, but appropriate.
What was he thinking? That was easily the most violent thing I've ever seen done on a football pitch. It's almost the most purely violent thing I've ever seen, period. Some cold-blooded shit. It was kind of beautiful, actually. Despicable, but still radiant in its maliciousness. I'm amazed. Books will be written about this moment. I will probably write them. A fucking heatbutt to the chest? Ice cold. Did he knew somehow that he couldn't play on? Pain? Frustration? Whoever wins this match, that headbutt will be the only thing remembered.
There's this weird, empty feeling inside right now that's echoed in the eerieness of hearing crickets chirp on a night when the world's supposed to be partying. Cheers still ring out, but Earth is still trying to get a grip on what's gone on in front of their eyes. Maybe it's just the shrillness of the broadcast stadium whistles fucking with me. This is the last game Zidane will ever play.
No Zizou, no Henry...10 men...hmm...
Stunned.
What the fuck did Materazzi say? Some unrepeatable racist repugnant shit. Enough was enough, maybe?
And how about Hector Elizondo? Two huge red cards handed out. The balls to give them certainly, and to two superstars no less. It had to have been given in Zidane's case, but dude just effectively ended Zidane's career.
119:13 - Wiltord you suck. Couldn't deliver a nice cross to an open Trezeguet on the break, nor even hit the target with a shot. Right, there's a game going on.
And it's likely going to penalties.
Names to remember, or forget: R. Baggio. D. Baggio.
The only name you have to know: Buffon.
The shot of Zidane walking down into the tunnel, right past the Jules Rimet trophy is just about all the Rimbaudian poeticism you could ever wring from a game of football. Cantona explains the world.
PENALTIES
Buffon v. Barthez.
Pirlo first. Goal. Stright down the center, Barthez guessed to the right.
Wiltord. Will this name live in infamy?...NO. Goal. A good penalty too.
Materazzi. Uh oh. Which stop on the rollercoaster do we get off on here? The highs. Great penalty. Barthez guessed correctly, but the shot was just too strong.
Trezeguet. Crossbar! NO GOAL!
De Rossi...hits the shot Trezeguet tried to hit. Perfect.
Italy's never won a W.C. penalty shootout. Just thought I'd pont that out before Del Piero shoots. And he scores.
Sagnol...scores. Man, he has big ears.
Grosso. If there's any justice in the world, he'll miss.
And there isn't. Italy are Champions.
POSTGAME
Did they just cut off Camoranesi's hair? Yep. Maybe he's off my shit list.
What is Zidane thinking right now? What does Henry think about Zidane at this moment? The rest of the team?
Why does Gattuso have no pants on? Someone please explain. He just bent over and barked I think.
From where I'm standing on this rooftop terrace, I can see the fireworks from Berlin's Olympiastadion, miles away while that freaking Amadou & Mariam song ("Zeit, Das Sich Vas Dreht") plays through the TV. I've heard it about a thousand times, but never with thoudsands of dollars worth of fireworks as a bassline. Now, "Finniculi, Finnicula."
Can never be mad at Buffon. And tomorrow we find out whether four of Italy's top teams will be relegated to Serie C. Including Buffon's Juve.
It's been fun...actually, it's been one of the strangest nights of my life. I'm, again, hurt, stunned, astounded, amazed, and dazed. I'll be trying to figure this one out for a good long minute. Goodnight.
HIGHLIGHTS
Better Than Yours
I know it was so wrong, but what was it called?
Lest B'n'C be accused of ignoring all you fine ladies out there, and for those who want to know what's really going on in the streets, you know, the ones populated with girls painted in multiple shades of national colors, in various states of undress and inebriation, affiliate and reputed Crown Princess Emcee MC [Not a rapper - Ed.] has been out and about, up down and around the world and the West Coast, canvassing, polling, reporting -- whatever it is one calls it when you talk in peoples faces and ask them things about things. Anyway, she's great at that and has compiled a rigorously scientific scale of male pulchritude, refined after many an hour perched in front of the telly, [insert offensive, sport-related, gerundal/adjectival double entendre here, then laugh - Ed.].
The Eusebios: Acknowledging World Cup's Finest Looking Men*
Where's Posh?: The "I'm Starting To Look Like Becks" Award**
Winner: Andriy Shevchenko. He's even starting to run like him.
Go Grease Lightnin': Best Sleaze on the Pitch Award.
Winner: Francesco Totti, per todo. Hard to pick from all potential Azzurri. But anyone who can compare the size of a football with his...["his Schweinsteiger?" "his Pekerman?" "his Vennegor of Hesselink?" - merely Ed.'s suggestions; also, here the prose trails off into some sort of dirty, meticulously detailed sex dream, which can be posted upon request]
Don't listen to Busta: The "Why'd You Cut Your Locks?" Award
Winner: Asamoah Gyan. Please, please man, bring back the fro. You were hotter with it.
Old man take a look at my life: The Real Golden Shoe
Winner: Tie, Cafu and Zinedine Zidane. Widow's Peak balding patterns? Whatever. Wrinkles? Shortsightedness? Sure. Still hot.
Weisswurst: The Hometown Hero Award
Winner: Jurgen Klinsmann. Klose comes clos-e [I'll let you get away with that one, don't know why - Ed.] and Ballack is perfecting his Will Hunting-pout, but sorry Boys, your blonde wonderboy coach is still hotter, especially when wearing his tight baby blue Lacostes and crisp white button-downs (rolled-up sleeves, of course).
Even Michael Owen is Older Than Me: The "Best All-Around Boytoy" Award
Winner: Luis Valencia (Cristiano comes a close second - but anyone named after Ronnie Reagan doesn't make the cut)
Little Red Corvette: The "You Look So Much Like Prince It Frightens Me" Award
Winner: Ronaldinho. He's already got just one name - now give me eyeliner and Purple Rain.
True Hotness: The Golden Eusebio
Winner: Fabio Cannavaro. Who knew? Defenders can be hot.
*These awards do not include any players from the USA. When asked about potential Americans, most women shuddered in way I haven't seen since a group of freshman girls did when they saw Captain Ma***ra running suicides in pre-season, circa 1998.
**For obvious reasons, we couldn't include Hotness himself, just not fair. [Neither is dude's voice - Ed's note]
Just Got Back From The Intergalactic Rapping Championships
So I'm lamping a bit
People always ask me things. They say, "Stijls, was Theodor Adorno right when he said that, 'Enlightenment's program was the disenchantment of the world?' " Or: "Yo son, can you explain me Baudrillard's conception of seduction? Can you break that shit down for me?" Or more common, "Is Dipset in this bitch?" I generally answer "Yes" to all of these. But the question I've been fielding most of all lately is, "Why have the French progressed so far in this 2006 World Cup? Their players are so old?" The answer is quite simple:
Djibril Cisse is a time-traveling gangster.*
Ask yourself these questions: Why is his hair so consistently awesome? [Alien barbers.] Why has he severely, gruesomely broken both of this legs in successive seasons? [Because of the skeletal fragility hastened by long periods of space travel.] Why can't he score goals for Liverpool? [Cos' they play in Liverpool.]
It seems quite obvious to me that the Zinedine Zidane that's playing out of his skull on pitches all across Germany is not the Zinedine Zidane of today, but that of 1999-2000. Claude Makelele? Nope: Makelele 2002. Lilian Thuram, currently of (relegated???) Juve? Uh-uh. Thuram 1998.
Hard to believe? Come on. We've all seen Bill & Ted. That shit works. (How else do you think Ribery's face got like that. Mangled in the machine, dude.) You're telling me that Cisse's supposed to be sitting on the sidelines, sadly watching his team make a run to the World Cup semi-finals as he heals from injury? Puh-leeze. Dude's chilling in intersidereal space, waiting for opportune moments to snatch up the stars of the past and replace the stars of the present with them. That is, when he's not blowing up the spot, a/k/a 'the supernova' with Dre 3000 and Delton 3030, co-pilot and navigator on the Spaceship Mother Earth.
Don't be surprised if you see "Thierry Henry: The Monaco Years" (that should be a TV show) out there tonight. Just saying. You'll have this guy to thank.
*Props to Ming Black.
...Just Italians
Okay, like a nation scorned. This is Bruegel, b/t/w.
In the middle of our life's journey, it sometimes becomes necessary to damn those who destroy a host country's hopes to hell. So take a trip with me, D. Alighieri, and our boy Virg-who's-nice-with-the-words, through the Italian National Team locker room.
The Opportunists/Outcasts: Massimo Oddo, Simone Barone, Andrea Barzagli, Cristian Zaccardo. Residing on the shores of the Acheron, a/k/a the substitutes bench, these are people who did nothing in life for good or evil, and are doomed to eternally pursue a banner and be pursued by wasps and hornets while maggots and other insects drink their blood and tears.
First Circle (Limbo): Fabio Cannavaro, Gianluca Zambrotta, Gianluigi Buffon, Luca Toni. Virtuous pagans call Limbo home; not necessarily sinful, but guilty by association. Anyway, they're in good company: Homer, Horace, Ovid, and Lucan can tell them bedtime stories each night. Buffon's a Renaissance man anyway.
Second Circle: Francesco Totti. For the lustful. Punishment includes being blown about by a violent storm without hope of rest, fine for a midfielder who flits about the field in various modes of concentration.
Third Circle: Filippo Inzaghi. Guarded by Cerberus, the Third Circle of Hell is for gluttons of any stripe, especially those who generally score gluts of terrible, ill-deserved goals.
Fourth Circle: Alessandro Nesta. Those of a miserly nature reside here, regardless of whether this quality respresents care with money or an unwillingness to allow opposing forwards opportunities to score.
Fifth Circle: Gennaro Gattuso, Marco Materazzi. The wrathful (which describes the former) are doomed to fight each other here on the surface, while the slothful (the latter) lie gurgling beneath the water.
Sixth Circle: Simone Perrotta. For heretics. Simone, your heretical claim is that you deserve national team selection.
Seventh Circle: Daniele De Rossi. Clearly, this circle houses the violent. Have fun elbowing the Minotaur in the face, buddy. It'll be the Inner 7th Circle for you: Violence against God, Nature, and Art get you afterlife in a flaming desert with fiery flakes raining from the sky.
Eighth Circle: Vincenzo Iaquinta, Fabio Grosso. Those guilty of deliberate, knowing evil, a/k/a/ the fraudulent reside here. Falsifiers that you two are, you shall be afflicted with various diseases, perhaps one that keeps you rigidly upright forever.
Ninth Circle: Mauro German Camoranesi. The ninth circle is for traitors, like those born of Argentine parentage, but who choose instead to play for Italy. And of course for those who choose to wear their hair like a samurai.
The Sad Face Invasion
Not coming through, coming through
Watch: Argentina Lose on Penalties to Germany
Watch: Argentina Fight Germany
Watch: Argentina and Germany Actually Score Goals in Normal Time
1nce again, the Schopenhegelian Germanic hordes defeated Argentina's Borges Boyz, not surprisingly in a penalty shootout. Baboons from here to the pampas have described this match as "tense," and have zeroed in on Argentine coach Jose Pekerman's early substitution of Riquelme and forced substitution of 'keeper Abbondanzieri (which limited any later additions of either Lionel Messi or Javier Saviola) as turning points of the match, and they're absolutely right -- but that's not the essential, interesting bit of it all.
What remains remarkable to me is how easy it is to tell who's going to miss their chance in a penalty shootout, simply by looking at the shooter's face as they line up at the top of the 18-yard box. It's a skill I picked up, most likely by hanging out way too much with my Southern Hemisphered homie Gosfais, a former wraithlike goalkeeper with a philosophical capacity (I'm sure) equal to that of his spiritual & positional predecessor Al B. Camus. Seemingly obvious, but foolproof nonetheless. For instance: Riquelme, given the chance to tie the Champions League semifinal second leg, wore an impossibly even sadder-than-normal face before shooting. Result: Jens Lehmann, the German hero of this W.C. quarterfinal, saved his shot with relative ease. Sure, this after-the-factness looks terrible, but we're gonna proceed anyway.
Roberto Ayala: Perennially haunted by the spectre of Dennis Bergkamp turning him out like Bobby did Whitney back in France '98, Ayala's eyes were hollower than Paolo Maldini's cheeks at an Armani photo shoot. [No photo necessary - Ed.]
Esteban Cambiasso: The only balding player on whom you can bet the farm animals when it comes to penalties is, of course, Zinedine Zidane (Had Pekerman substituted differently, this could have been Pablo Aimar shooting instead). [B/T/W, the "Shit But You Don't Know It" jack was completeley unintentional - Ed.]
And though it may seem like Brit-bashing at this point,
Frank Lampard: Prissy T-Rex arms only get you so far in this world, and having all the blood drain from your already too-pale face, only to settle, leaden, in your boots does you no favors when you're the first (technically best) penalty taker.
Steven Gerrard: I think it was an ESPN writer who noted that Gerrard was most visibly affected by Lampard's opening miss for England. That empty feeling carried over into his walk up to the spot and the timid stare he gave Portuguese 'keeper Ricardo right before shooting (Ricardo himself has claimed to have been able to see where the England player were going to shoot "in their eyes" which is a lofty one for sure, but from first to last these guys were about as transparent as my spookfaced friend).
Jamie Carragher: Once his first shot was called back for taking it too early, there was simply no chance he'd score on the second. Even he knew that; hence, the unsurprised look on his face as he walked back to the center circle to watch Ronaldo put them out of their misery.
* * * * * * *
ITALY v. UKRAINE [3-0]
Luca Toni, Not Sleeping With Fishes
When you sit less than 5 rows away from Francesco Totti, it becomes immediately apparent that he is only the rarest of times in touch with this plane of existence. This is not a compliment. Sure, he wanders about the midfield, occasionally nudging on a brilliant ball, but for the most part he's dreaming -- of what I don't know. His wife, Roman gelato, the dude sitting next to me smoking hash, twenty Nespresso machines lined up in rows, a Rick Ross remix of Carla Bruni's Quelqu'un M'a dit -- who can say for sure?
What is certain is that Andriy Shevchenko has the worst pouty-face in international football. It's almost sickening to watch: Middling Ukrainian midfielder spots Sheva calling for a pass, pass is delivered 4 yards off target, Italian defender clears, Sheva throws tantrum fit for a 3-year old. 
Yes, it's clear that no one on the Ukranian side has the quality or epidermal oleaginousness of Andrea Pirlo, but that's no reason to broadcast that thought to the world with your screwface mug every time you don't get the service you're used to on your multimillion dollar club team. But Sheva did kind of make up for that petty insolence after the match, trotting over to the rabid Italian fans and giving them a hand for their support during his years at AC Milan (despite the fact that they booed him lustily every time he touched the ball, now that he's Chelsea-bound).
And as much as I love to hate them, the sentiment expressed for their fallen comrade Gianluca Pessotto was genuine, and lovely to see:
But then you hear about this and all those warm-fuzzies crust up like the cold in your eyes come morning. Either way, it all makes for an interesting match this evening. I wonder how the Italians will spin this one, given it's the Germans suffering after scandal...
"Suspended Frings Poisons Pre-Game Penne!" -- advance headline from tomorrow's Gazzetta dello Sport, translated, of course.
Hate Me Now
But he won't stop now
Watch: Wayne Rooney Sent Off Against Portugal
You knew this was coming. [Full disclosure: Okay, so I am actually making out with Ronaldo as I type. Happens.] There are certain things which I'm willing to concede in this argument: 1) Ronaldo dives, early and often, and this is indeed annoying. 2) He dribbles when he should pass, stands still and feints when he should dribble, and, for having a near-woeful capacity for finishing chances, overestimates the greatness of his shot. 3) The amount of product festering in Ronaldo's hair seems to be at alarmingly toxic levels, even at mid-match (I'm concerned), and this might be having a deleterious effect on the boy's thinking. 4) Hopping on the penalty spot is no way to make friends (but a fantastic way to make Paul Robinson dookie his shorts). 5) Winking towards your bench after an opposing player -- who happens to be your club teammate -- has been sent off is not exactly a stirring example of your innocence in any incident. And, of course, this.
Which is not to say that Wayne Rooney is not a complete fucking idiot. A thick-necked, barrel-chested footballing genius for sure, but still, breathtakingly stupid. Thing is, Rooney's acted in this manner since his first game in the Premiership. Everybody -- the footballing world and probably beyond -- knows this, and Ronaldo more than most since he plays alongside him for 70+ odd games a year, not to mention all the hours spent training, traveling, and partying together. Not only does everybody know this but Everybody -- especially the English -- are aware that it is a tactic of opposing players to purposely try and wind Rooney up precisely because he has trouble keeping his temper down. A result like this is always at least possible whenever Rooney steps on the pitch.
Now Rooney's cleats were firmly planted on Carvalho's Ricardo, but how much of that was intentional I don't know. He was being hounded by two defenders and heroically, impossibly holding both of them off the ball -- typical Rooney stuff. That his foot ended up in another man's crotch is unfortunate, for one man more than the other certainly, but his response was also typical Rooney. I don't think I've ever seen him apologize to any player he's ever fouled, and he certainly didn't here. Instead he let off with the by-now-requisite stream of profanities (In a previous Premiership match, he's reputed to have said 'fuck off' directly to referee Graham Poll in excess of 25 times in some absurdly short amount of time). And here's where Ronaldo comes in.
Running over to the referee and gesturing down at Carvalho, Ronaldo -- as many game reports have put it -- "seemed to encourage [referee Horacio Elizondo] to punish Rooney for a stamp on Ricardo Carvalho." That every player, when fouled, looks up expectantly at the referee -- and those fouled particularly hard couple those incredulous eyes with the international gesture for "card" -- still does not make it right, only normal.
I ask: What kind of referee needs, or takes, encouragement from players to give cards? What kind of referee allows that to happen? Technically, he's only supposed to listen to two players (or rather, those players are the only ones allowed to talk to the ref): the captains of each team. (That's why you see so many of those curt, 'shhht' gestures from good referees whenever he's being trailed by a bunch of protesting, non-arm-banded players, usually Italian.) And unless Elizondo's sweet on Li'l Crissy, I think Ronaldo would have probably been the player least respected on the field, for any number of reasons, probably starting with his style of running.
So what does Rooney do, while staring at the ref who is staring back, but push Ronaldo. And you're ['You' being the legions of English reading this at the moment] surprised that he was red-carded? Unjust? Please. Ronaldo participating in the post-stomp conversation may not have been the height of sportsmanship, but it was far from dirty play. Had Ronaldo been sent off at the "prompting" (for the sake of example I'm willing to go with the idea that prompting the ref even works, though I don't believe it) of Rooney I would love to see the reaction from the British press. He'd have been hailed as not merely a football genius but a cunning gamesman as well. Unfortunately, Rooney's just not that smart, or just not in that way.
Now we get into ideas of "morality" -- not only whose morality is superior but also whose stereotypical "values" are professed louder. The English, of course, would *never* do such a thing. Maybe that's right, I don't know (I don't think so). But maybe that's why they lose. Whatever. But if you listen to the BBC pundits (and I'm sure it's Alan Shearer who says it) talk about Ronaldo heading over to the ref, he very clearly says something to the effect of "Look at that. WE never do that." Really Alan? But apparently WE are fine with punching, kicking and elbowing whenever the ref isn't looking, eh? I find it hard to believe you'd be the player you are now revered to have been without all those 'extras' that you got away with in your career.
But the reaction from all corners of England is the truly reprehensible bit of it all. Let's start with Young Wayne, who's promised to "split him in two and smack him in the head." Fine. I'd expect nothing less, or nothing more, from him. But Gerrard and Lampard are a different story:
"I saw what Ronaldo did," said Steven Gerrard, according to English reports. "I saw him going over to the referee and giving him the card and I think he was bang out of order. If he were one of my teammates I would be absolutely disgusted with him. After Wayne was sent off he (Ronaldo) winked at his bench and his teammates and that just about sums him up as a person. If I were playing against a teammate from Liverpool and they were involved in a situation like that I would never try to get them sent off."I tend to believe Gerrard, if only because he seems like a stand-up guy (no pun intended), but I have to also believe that if England were playing Spain and he had the chance to get little alice-band-wearing Luis Garcia sent off, he just might not let deed follow word. But wait, did Ronaldo actually present the red card to Rooney? If so, then hold up -- wait a minute! Stop all the blogging! Let the FIFA investigation commence! Who knew dude was packing Prell and spare red cards in his pants all game? Did no one notice? Was it the +Teamgeist again? And Lampard:
"He's supposed to be a teammate of Wayne's at Manchester United and he does something like that. It's not nice, is it? A lot has been made of trying to promote fair play in this tournament and that was certainly not fair play. Unfortunately that's the way it is with some players. We were told that anyone who tried to get someone else a yellow or red card would get a yellow but it just hasn't happened.""It's not nice, is it?" No, what was "not nice" was your penalty, nor your play during any of England's matches. Cry fair play all you want to after the match, Frank, but while you still had a chance to win the match, you failed and failed miserably. I have the same problem with Americans crying that they were jobbed by referee Markus Merk with a phantom penalty in the Ghana match when the team had a full 45 minutes to right that wrong. And the English "press:"
The Sun has joined the anti-Ronaldo bandwagon, printing a mock dartboard with a picture of Ronaldo winking.Right. Again, I'm not surprised, but I'm no less angered at this scapegoating. Rooney, while dumb, is not the villain, but neither should Ronaldo be claimed the same. It's a shame that he'll most likely no longer be able to play for Manchester United now that he's burned bridges with another one of their star players [Full disclosure: Sir Alex Ferguson has now entered the room and is watching me make out with Ronaldo. I think he likes it.] Hello, Real Madrid, friendly home to all primadonna ex-United #7's.
"Here's every England fan's chance to get revenge on the world's biggest winker," the paper said.
So in the end, this is less of a defense of Ronaldo than it is an attack on the English mindset at large -- that of the press, the players, and the people -- that is more than willing to vilify foreigners that play in England (who, at large, are blamed for offenses as diverse as bringing diving, defensive football, great food, and superb technical skill into the country) while claiming the moral high ground for themselves. It could only have been Ronaldo to eliminate England once penalties were certain, and given the petulance with which they've reacted to losing -- as petulant as Rooney's push -- they deserved nothing more than Ronaldo's kiss before their collective dying.
