Oh! Zizou!.............

[Alcazar]

............what were you thinking?

Alcazar[:(]

[Russethouse]

Can I come out from behind the sofa ?

One moments madness, a lifetime of regret!

Don't forget his moments of greatness though......a fantastic player.

[Deby]

Ooops!  Who knows what pressure some men of greatness succumb too.  Still excellent and I choose to remember this than the carte rouge!

Ditto applies to a certain young scouser!

Deby

[Tresco]

Well the young scouser has about 14 years to go, before he can have a chance of being held in the same esteem as Zidane.

A justified Red card.

I'm so gutted. Losing would have been bearable, but that made it so grim[:'(]

[nimportequoi]

The red card wasjustified for Zizou, but I'd love to know what Materazzi said to him to provoke the head butt! What a shame he is retiring, he is such a magical player.

[Alcazar]

[quote user="SusanAH"]

The red card wasjustified for Zizou, but I'd love to know what Materazzi said to him to provoke the head butt! What a shame he is retiring, he is such a magical player.

[/quote]

From the close up BEFORE the red card, it appeared that Materazzi tweaked Zizou's nipple, quite painful, and then goaded him.

Not justifying the response, but there you go. Modern footy. Been going on for years. anyone else remember the infamous shot of Vinnie Jones grabbing and twisting Paul Gascoigne's testicles during a match? And then we wonder why our kids resort to cheating to win.

Alcazar

[Jon 1]

There was such hypocrisy displayed by the BBC 'football experts' after the France-Italy match, concerning Zidane's stupidity.  They kept going on about Zidane's bad behaviour, yet Rooney has been essentially whitewashed and the Portuguese player has been made the scapegoat.

 

Wayne Rooney's action was just as, if not more deplorable, as it was more painful, and could have been more serious.

 

I was most disdisgusted as I thought the English prided themselves in their sense of fair play!

 

Zidane and Rooney are both thugs and very bad examples to football youth.

 

The problem is that the stain on Zidane's character may help French youth.  The whitewash of Rooney and the scapegoating of the Portuguese player will send out the totally wrong message to English football youth and the supporters.

 

It is time these types of footballers were shown up for what they are, ill educated moronic thugs.

[ali-cat]

I have to disagree, Jon.  I'm not a big Rooney fan - so I'm honestly not biased, but no matter how many times I've seen the Rooney "stamp" - I think it was accidental.  Figo & Zidans's head butts, were not.  I really would love to know what had been said to Zidane to provoke such an attack - but unfortunately, it still won't excuse his behaviour.  From what I have heard - if it is true that it was a racist comment - it dosen't say much for the FIFA "fair play" statements read out at the quarter finals & if it could be proved I hope that Materazzi is also punished!

I thought the BBC pundits covered it very well - they all said they hoped his final match would not over shadow, what had been a brilliant career.  I hope it dosen't.  The likes of Cantona, Best & others are still remembered for their football - not their mistakes, on or off the pitch.

[Rosebud]

I fully agree with Ali.  Rooney was goaded , as was Zidan, no doubt.  Ronaldo deserves all the critisism he gets.  His behaviour towards Rooney and then that cocky wink to the bench was unreal!  I hope Alex Ferguson dumps him pronto!  I'm no Rooney fan either but in this case he was NOT the villian.

I'm SO pleased Zidan won the golden ball, despite what happened last night.  Yes, he behaved badly, but he is a truly fantastic player and deserves to be remembered as such.

We went to Place Capitol in Toulouse for the first half of the game.  The atmosphere was fantastic, I'll never forget it.  Yeah, it's a shame France lost, but I was genuinly happy for the Italiens, and at least we were able to get a good nights sleep after all! [:-))]

 

 

[Viv]

[quote user="Jon"]

 

 

Wayne Rooney's action was just as, if not more deplorable, as it was more painful, and could have been more serious.

 

[/quote]

I don't think it hurt that much.

 I have never seen anyone make such a quick recovery to a kick to the testicles.

Rooney actions were inexcusable  but I think Zidane's was even worse.

[Miki]

I agree with you Ali, Zidane is no

thug, he simply had a momentary lapse. He has been an excellent ambassador for

French football and indeed for France itself.

I would never condone vicious cowardly attacks and regardless of what

was said or done to Zidane and  believe me, he has been called

just about everything in his superb career and been chopped down

countless times but what he did in that final was just one tiny moment of

emotion in which he simply lost control.

As for Besty, I would think everyone knows  how I feel about one

of the few playersin soccer that can truly be called a genius.

As for Zidane being the best player up until then, well I don't thinks so. I thought that  Captain, Fabio Cannavaro and

Gennaro Gattuso for Italy were incredible. France left Henry alone and

although he showed some moments of his magic, he was all to often left

wandering up front on his own. France overall were probably the best

side but Italy played as one, not all of them played well but

for the aficianado, their defence was superb. Only one goal scored by

an opponent (dubious penalty by Zidane) and an own goal was all the

Azurri conceeded through the tournament.

[powerdesal]

I dont rate footballers very highly and I have only watched excerts

from various games, but judging from the 'scrabbly' play immediatly

before Rooneys 'so called' kick/stamp in the g****** it looked like an

innocent contact which, as Viv says did not appear to hurt much. You

get far worse in a rugby game.

Referee bias is the first thought irrespective of which nationality was involved.

Zidane was a totally different thing, he should have shrugged ANY

comment off at that stage of the match and at that point in his career.