Not in my view a victory worthy of a night of hooting cavalcades...but then I'm not Italian.Zizou certainly made sure we'd all remember his final appearance for les bleus. And amazingly, "Zid Vicious" has today been awarded the Golden Ball for best player of the tournament. (Voting took place at half time.)
And so it ends for another four years. I saw most of the second stage out in Guatemala where they describe this 64 partido glut as los festejos, treating it essentially a month-long public festival. Hardly any of the TV ads failed to reference the Mundial and most showed off a sense of humour that British advertising has sadly lost over the last decade or so.
Perhaps in part because of the pan-Latin anti-European sentiment I could sense out in Central America, I've even found myself letting off cuetes for the French and the Germans as they saw off the Argies and then the Brazilians, teams that seemed to think they only had each other to worry about.
At least we're not as bad at penalties as the Swiss!
The commentators on Guatemala's channels 3 and 7 may have sat behind desks in drab 80's-style studios and struggled with surnames like Sweinsteiger and Hargreaves (shvenstegger/hairgrafe) but otherwise delighted with their uplifting lexicon of zapatazos, pelotazos, sombreritos, (rrr)remates and contra-remates. I have reproduced a few of their more accomplished verbal passes below:
Tirar la pelota para bajar cocos: a shot designed to bring down coconuts - Lampard, Maniche etc.
Irse a la piscina verde: to plunge into the green pool i.e. take a dive - C. Ronaldo, Henry etc.
Son como divorciados, nunca se buscan, nunca se acercan: they're like a divorced couple, they never look for each other or get close to each other - of Aimar and Riquelme.
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