by Nick Holt
France equalised just before half-time and Vieira was at the heart of it, his driving run and pass releasing Ribéry. The young winger had impressed so far with his dribbling at pace and his quick, neat passing, but his finishing had been woeful. Not when it really mattered here, though, he rounded Casillas at speed and tucked the ball past the retreating defenders. Domenech’s gamble in leaving out the more experienced Ludovic Giuly was paying off – although one could ask why Giuly was not playing on the other side in place of the wasteful Malouda.
Zidane, with the comfort of good cover behind him, was beginning to find some form and enjoy himself and he put through Malouda with a delicate pass, but the winger couldn’t get enough height on his lob to beat Casillas. Aragonés, sensing the tide was turning, brought on Luis García and Joaquin for Raúl and Villa. It changed the game but not in Spain’s favour. Torres was forced into the middle, where Gallas consumed him, and Joaquin’s runs, while exciting and skilful, ended in the usual blind alleys and poor finishes. A talented player, he disappeared when coaches realised the lack of an end product wasn’t going to change – Theo Walcott, take heed.
Zidane took a free-kick about thirty-five yards out with a few minutes remaining. Xabi Alonso just got his head to the ball but it looped invitingly for Vieira to head home at the far post. Spain could muster no response and Zidane scored his side’s third, racing clear down the left in injury-time, cutting back too easily inside Puyol and thumping home with his right foot.
Yet again Spain were left holding the bouquet. The fault lay with Aragonés; he failed to match France’s power with Senna, his enforcer left on the bench, and his young midfield stars, brilliant as they were, got a pounding from the awesome Vieira. Suddenly France, with Zidane awoken and Ribéry looking a real find, were in contention.
QUARTER-FINALS
Germany against Argentina: it was to be hoped the game was better than their last Finals encounter, the drab and dirty 1990 final. It was, but it was no classic. Argentina, after their ebullient showing in the groups, had become more defensive as the tournament wore on. Pekerman left out the clever link player Saviola in favour of the bustling aggression of young Tévez and preferred Lucho González to Cambiasso.
Neither change paid off. González, the Porto midfielder had played seventeen minutes against Serbia and picked up a knock. He came into the game cold and did very little. Tévez, still learning, played too high and was picked off by Mertesacker and Metzelder – the clever Saviola would have dragged them out of position more and created space.
It was a set play that broke the deadlock, after forty-five minutes in which neither goalkeeper had to make a serious save. Four minutes into the second period Argentina were ahead when Riquelme, who had been nullified by Frings, curled a corner onto the head of Ayala. Germany’s equaliser was from a similar direct route, Ballack’s free-kick finding Klose unmarked for once. The Werder Bremen centre-forward, top scorer in the Bundesliga that year, didn’t miss many of those.
Both sides looked tired and scared in extra-time, and neither bust a gut to win the game. Pekerman took off Riquelme for a runner, Cambiasso, and used Julio Cruz for Crespo instead of young Messi for Maxi or González. His third substitution was forced upon him when his goalkeeper picked up an injury. Germany took off Klose, who toiled alone as Podolski helped in midfield, and sent on the willing Neuville. With the best forwards in the match off the field, penalties beckoned and duly arrived.
It was Argentina who died wondering; the Germans were predictably ruthless with their spot-kicks while Ayala and Cambiasso weren’t. Pekerman had taken off two of their best dead-ball strikers and didn’t use another. Lehmann indulged in a piece of gamesmanship during the shoot-out, appearing to consult notes kept in the back of the goal about each Argentinian kicker. The paper was blank; who knows whether it had any effect, but it was typical of Lehmann, a very smart chap who occasionally veered over into smart-arse.
Argentina inexplicably started a ruckus after the game was over and Cufré, an unused sub, received a red card. Just when we were thinking they’d stopped all that nonsense and were just about the football.
Italy beat Ukraine 3–0. Buffon made a couple of good saves and Ukraine hit the woodwork a couple of times, but one always had a sense Italy were in third gear. None of the close shaves was from Shevchenko, who left with a whimper, and the Ukraine defence couldn’t deal with the power of Luca Toni. Italy weren’t missing De Rossi; his absence had created an opportunity for Milan’s dog of war, Gennaro Gattuso, and his industry and selflessness alongside Pirlo and behind Totti gave Italy a mightily impressive spine. Played five, conceded one own goal. How very Italian.
France enjoy beating Brazil in the World Cup Finals and have done it more often than anyone else. But never before was it this easy. Forget 1–0, this was a lot more comfortable than Italy’s win over the Ukraine. Brazil just didn’t show. Gallas pocketed Ronaldo – for a couple of years he was the best man-marking centre-half around – and Ronaldinho and Kaká contributed only in little flashes. Carlos Parreira retreated to the way he instinctively wanted to play – defensively – and his team expired quietly. The two defensive midfielders for Brazil just couldn’t cope with the movement of Zidane, Henry and Ribéry, who kept swapping positions, and they were pushed deeper and deeper so the talent ahead of them was cut off from the back six.
France created chance after chance; a header from Malouda, a through ball that Ribéry just lost under his feet, Ribéry’s cross flashing across the goal, a header past the post from Vieira.
The goal was from a set play when it came. Zidane took a free-kick out on the left and whipped it right footed over the defence. Henry attacked around the back and smashed the ball past Dida on the half-volley. As the players lined up for the free-kick, Henry’s marker decided this was a good time to tie his shoelaces, and had only just finished doing so as Dida picked the ball out of the net. Guess who? The best left-back in the world, according to him. Yes, it was our old friend, Roberto Carlos. Sorry to harp on, folks, but that is unforgivable. That was his last contribution to the World Cup.
England lost to Portugal on penalties for the second major tournament in a row. That’s the bare bones of it. England played poorly in the first half (Portugal were only marginally better), lost David Beckham to injury, Wayne Rooney to a red card, and then the match when Jamie Carragher had to retake a penalty, missed it, and watched Cristiano Ronaldo administer the lethal injection to Eriksson’s time as England manager.
England were much better after the sending off; not because Rooney, or indeed Beckham were awful – neither were worse than their colleagues up to that point – but because they needed a sense of injustice to fuel the passion Eriksson so singularly failed to tap into. His selection was usually sound, the injury to Owen had forced him into the formation he should have used anyway (shades of Bryan Robson’s shoulder in 1990) but he just never seemed to rouse the guys. I don’t mean up and at ’em, get it forward, hare-brained gung-ho football, but the instillation of the self-belief required to win these things.
Too much was made of Ronaldo’s little wink to his mates. We already knew he was a sneaky little so-and-so, so we shouldn’t have been surprised. That referee Elizondo was right to send off Rooney was incontrovertible; he stamped on a player.
England deserve some credit for their rearguard action against a really talented team. And at least they bore their disappointment with some dignity, unlike Argentina. They saw off Figo – his replacement, Postiga came closest to scoring – and neutered Ronaldo, which seems to be easier in World Cup games than club games. I’m still not sure whether that tells us something about him or about Portugal. All the back four defended well, and Hargreaves was immense in the holding role and fully deserved his man of the match award. Hargreaves’ injury problems started in earnest the following year after he signed for Manchester United; he has been sorely missed by England.
England Squad 2006:
GK: Paul Robinson (Tottenh
am Hotspur, 26, 21), David James (Manchester City, 35, 34), Scott Carson (Liverpool, 20, 0)
DEF: Wayne Bridge (Chelsea, 25, 23), Jamie Carragher (Liverpool, 28, 25), Sol Campbell (Arsenal, 31, 68), Ashley Cole (Arsenal, 25, 46), Rio Ferdinand (Manchester United, 27, 47) Gary Neville (Man Utd, 31, 79), John Terry (Chelsea, 25, 24)
MID & WIDE: David Beckham (Cpt, Real Madrid, 31, 89), Michael Carrick (Tottenham, 24, 6), Joe Cole (Chelsea, 24, 32), Stewart Downing (Middlesbrough, 21, 2), Steven Gerrard (Liverpool, 26, 42), Owen Hargreaves (Bayern Munich, 25, 30), Jermaine Jenas (Tottenham, 23, 15), Frank Lampard (Chelsea, 27, 40), Aaron Lennon (Tottenham, 19, 1), Theo Walcott* (Arsenal, 20, 1)
FWD: Peter Crouch (Liverpool, 25, 7), Michael Owen (Newcastle United, 26, 77), Wayne Rooney (Man Utd, 20, 29)
SEMI-FINALS
THIRD-PLACE MATCH
Make that played six, conceded one own goal for Italy. A match that was engrossing rather than exciting for ninety minutes was pulsating in the extra half-hour – a similar pattern to the epic these two countries played out in 1970.
There is a reason extra-time was so exciting and it has everything to with history. Germany have never lost a World Cup penalty shoot-out, winning four. Italy were eliminated in 1990, 1994 and 1998 on penalties and it hung over them like a big old hangy thing.
So Marcello Lippi, who in every other circumstance was a typical safety-first Italian manager, did the unthinkable and told his team to throw caution to the wind. Just look at his substitutions: Gilardino for Toni was obvious and like for like, he had used it already. Iaquinta for Camoranesi was a goalscorer for a box-to-box wide player, and Del Piero for Perrotta meant he had three out-and-out strikers on the pitch, plus Totti and Pirlo. Unthinkable.
Gilardino hit the post, Zambrotta smacked a twenty-yarder against the bar, Podolski forced a great save out of Buffon – it was all happening at a frantic pace considering nearly two hours had gone and it was hot. Andrea Pirlo, superb throughout, poured one last little pass inside two German defenders and Fabio Grosso slapped it home gleefully from the inside-right position. Two minutes to go in a crucial match and an Italian left-back is in the inside-right slot. The world had gone mad. Grosso did, charging around as if his heart was about to burst from his chest – echoes of Tardelli, I do love a bit of Italian machismo and pride. Two minutes later Gilardino’s clever little reverse ball found Del Piero in support and he curled a terrific finish around Lehmann.
Germany had played their part and as always had confounded expectations. Klinsmann was one of the characters of the tournament, kicking every shot, throwing water bottles around and exploding with emotion at every decision, but never inappropriately. They were written off beforehand; we were told they had no world-class players except Ballack. Well Lahm, Klose and Friedrich all looked pretty classy from where I was, and Podolski, Lehmann, Mertesacker and Schneider weren’t far behind.
France’s win against Portugal was far easier than one goal from the penalty spot suggests. Portugal barely made a chance and seemed more interested in trying to get someone else sent off. Cristiano Ronaldo had a shocker against two full-backs who were France’s weak spot.
World Cup Heroes No.33
Miroslav Klose (1978–)
Germany
I feel the same way about Miroslav Klose as I do about Paul Collingwood, the England cricketer. They are sportsmen who amount to so much more than the sum of their natural abilities.
Miroslav Klose is a Polish name. Miroslav moved to Germany to join his father when he was eight years old. He has retained his roots, despite his successful career in Germany, and has a Polish wife and bilingual children.
Klose’s football career was a slow burn. He started at Hamburg and signed for Kaiserslautern, a strong but unfashionable club in 1999. He was a steady rather than spectacular goalscorer, and made his debut for Germany in 2001, just in time to make the 2002 World Cup squad. Good in the air but limited on the ground, he was cited as an example of the paucity of talent available to Germany.
A hat-trick against Saudi Arabia made people sit up and notice, but Klose faded in the latter part of the competition against better defenders. It was the 2006 World Cup in his adopted country that made critics realise here was a serious player; his partnership with another Polish-born striker Lukas Podolski, took Germany to the semi-finals when an early demise was predicted. Klose was still great in the air – he really attacks the ball – but his movement had improved enormously and he worked on his touch and his link play.
Klose shows every sign of keeping going until a fourth World Cup where he will probably be used as an impact substitute – a nice option for any manager to have the second highest scorer in World Cup history on the bench. He holds that record equally with his countryman, whose national goalscoring record he equalled in autumn 2013. Klose modestly pointed out it took him twice as many games and Müller was a far better player; he was right but it showed his common sense.
I didn’t rate Klose when I saw him first in 2002, I thought him simply a punisher of bad defences, but I admire his hard work, dedication and fitness and he stands as an example that an ordinary player can, in time, become a really rather splendid one. And I think there’s something rather heroic about that.
WORLD CUP FINAL No.18
9 July 2006, Olympiastadion, Berlin; 69,000
Referee: Hector Elizondo (Argentina)
Coaches: Raymond Domenech (France) & Marcello Lippi (Italy)
France (4–2–3–1): Fabien Barthez (Olympique de Marseille); Willy Sagnol (Bayern Munich), Lilian Thuram (Juventus), William Gallas (Chelsea), Éric Abidal (Lyon); Patrick Vieira (Juventus), Claude Makélélé (Chelsea); Franck Ribéry (Olympique de Marseille), Zinedine Zidane (Real Madrid), Florent Malouda (Lyon); Thierry Henry (Arsenal). Subs: Alou Diarra (Lens) 56m for Vieira; David Trezeguet (Juventus) 100m for Ribéry; Sylvain Wiltord (Lyon) 107m for Henry
Italy (4–4–1–1): Gianluigi Buffon (Juventus); Gianluca Zambrotta (Juventus), Fabio Cannavaro (Cpt, Juventus), Marco Materazzi (Internazionale), Fabio Grosso (Palermo); Mauro Camoranesi (Juventus), Gennaro Gattuso (AC Milan), Andrea Pirlo (AC Milan), Simone Perrotta (Roma); Francesco Totti (Roma); Luca Toni (Fiorentina). Subs: Daniele De Rossi (Roma) 61m for Perrotta; Vincenzo Iaquinta (Udinese) 61m for Totti; Alessandro del Piero (Juventus) 87m for Camoranesi
Cautioned: Zambrotta (Ita) 5m, Sagnol (Fra) 12m, Diarra ((Fra) 76m, Malouda (Fra) 111m
Dismissed: Zidane (Fra) 110m
The game itself was unremarkable. Zidane played well and was an influence on the first half, but Gattuso did enough to stop him running the game, while Vieira got himself in Pirlo’s face to stop the Milanese imposing his style on affairs.
The big incidents in the game all involved Marco Materazzi. The big centre-half was not a typical Italian defender, he looked ungainly at times and was reckless in the tackle. So he was when he challenged Florent Malouda after six minutes – clear penalty. Zidane coolly chipped his kick down the middle. Italy were level soon after, Materazzi showing a positive side to his game when he thumped home a header from Pirlo’s inviting free-kick. The two goals Materazzi scored in the Finals were his only international goals.
The third incident came with ten minutes to go in extra-time. The game was creeping towards penalties, and both sides seemed to have run out of ideas. Ribéry’s runs had dried up and Henry had gone off exhausted; their replacements, Trezeguet and Wiltord were not of the same calibre. Italy had replaced Totti with the abrasive De Rossi, back from a four-match suspension. It seemed a little wrong that he was able to play in the final after his assault.
With time running out Zidane and Materazzi had a little spat; it all seemed a bit of nothing until Zidane clearly head-butted the Italian defender. The incident has been over-analysed. It does not matter what Materazzi said. Not in the context of the game; if Zidane found it so unspeakable he should have raised the matter afterwards not chinned the man. So Zidane walked. Bizarrely, the next day, he was declared the player of the tour
nament. Even without the head-butt that decision was wrong. Zidane played well for two matches; Cannavaro was peerless for the entire competition.
France had lost a key penalty taker. The Italians all scored theirs, including Materazzi, who deserves a bit of credit here for keeping his nerve. Grosso, the semi-final match-winner, scored the last kick with his trusty left and the Azzurri had won the World Cup.
The win provided a bit of relief for Italian football. The tournament was played while an investigation continued against various Serie A clubs (including Juventus and Milan) for match-rigging; none of the World Cup squad were implicated.
World Cup Heroes No.34
Fabio Cannavaro (1973–)
Italy
Fabio Cannavaro was well thought of but not fully appreciated before the 2006 World Cup. He was there in 2002 but picked up a couple of yellow cards and missed the disaster against South Korea – probably a good career move. Four years later, with the great Paolo Maldini retired, the Juventus star was now the lynchpin of the back four alongside Nesta – or Materazzi as it transpired. It is a testimony to his quality that he adapted so comfortably to a change of partner
Cannavaro is only five foot nine, but his timing and jumping are so good it goes unnoticed. Quick, without being a whippet, and solid in the tackle, he is a centre-back you don’t notice, because he doesn’t do extravagant and he doesn’t make conspicuous errors. You just notice that the other sides don’t score many goals. Italy conceded two in this World Cup – one hapless own goal and Zidane’s penalty in the final.