Very good reading by Gabriele Marcotti - a man who knows Matrix:
Parting words
Zidane's legacy is his elegant game, not a vicious exit
Posted: Wednesday July 12, 20069:02PM; Updated: Thursday July 13, 20061:38AM
The French singer Jean-Louis Murat summed up Zinédine Zidane like this: "Nobody knows if Zidane is an angel or a demon ... He smiles like Saint Teresa and grimaces like a serial killer."
Murat is a huge Zizou fan and there is a fair dose of truth in those words. His genius has always had a dark side, as evidenced by the 14 red cards he collected in his career. The last month showed him at his best -- when, as one paper put it, he was the only "Brazilian" on the pitch when France played Brazil -- and at his worst, when he head-butted Marco Materazzi in the World Cup final.
His final public appearance, Wednesday night, could have offered some degree of redemption, but, instead, it was more darkness than light.
Zidane said Materazzi provoked him by insulting his mother and sister. And he said that while he apologized to the "children" who had witnessed the incident (but, bizarrely, nobody else who might not have enjoyed seeing a grown man assault another adult) he had no regrets and would do it all over again.
"I tell myself that if things happened this way, it's because somewhere up there it was decided that way," he added.
That last part was perhaps the most absurd. Blaming God -- or whatever deity you believe in -- for your actions borders on the demented. Whatever your religion, one thing they all share is that there is a degree of free will, that God gives you the power to make your own decisions. The "God wanted it that way" defense (and it's not-so-distant cousin the "God made me do it" defense) is particularly hard to swallow.
Beyond that, discovering that Materazzi had "only" insulted Zidane's mother and sister was a bit of a letdown. Anybody who has played any kind of competitive team sport at any level (with the possible exception of volleyball and polo) will have heard a fair amount of trash talking.
It's ugly, sure. It's childish, absolutely. But most people do not snap and head-butt opponents when their mother is insulted, particularly when that insult occurs in the private sphere of two men at close quarters on a soccer pitch.
The fact that Zidane did not elaborate on the nature of the insult only adds to the confusion. What horrible thing could Materazzi have said that would prompt such a reaction in a normal person?
The answer is ... nothing. Insults of that nature hurt the most when they come from someone who actually knows you (or your mother). Materazzi has never met Zidane's mother or his sister. He only knows Zidane as an opponent. And, if he did insult either one, most would have taken it and responded in kind.
Of course, the whole matter of whether Materazzi even insulted Mrs. Zidane is open to debate. The Inter defender denies it in the strongest terms: though he admits to insulting the French captain, albeit in a way which is common in sporting arenas everywhere. Who you believe on this point is a matter of personal choice. I've known Materazzi for eight years, I know that his mother died when he was 15, there is no doubt in my mind that, when it comes to mothers, he treads very carefully. But then, maybe I'm biased, because I know and like Materazzi.
But even if one chooses to believe Zidane, it's difficult to reach any other conclusion than this: his act was indefensible and he certainly did not help himself with his explanation, particularly when he suggested that he would do the exact same thing again if faced with the same situation.
A more plausible explanation for Zidane's actions is that he was simply exhausted and frustrated and he lost control, just as he did so many times before. It started in 1993, when he got into a fist fight with Marcel Desailly, it continued through a career which saw him stomp on a Saudi defender, punch Parma's Enrico Chiesa, head-butt a Hamburg player, lash out at Villarreal's Quique Alvarez and, finally, nail Materazzi.
Some people are like that. They're human. Zidane was blessed with an outrageous amount of talent, as well as the intelligence and work ethic to make the best of it. But he's not perfect. The price of all that was a short fuse, a red mist that occasionally engulfed him.
Zidane will no doubt be criticized for not apologizing. But there are few things worse than an empty apology. If he doesn't feel sorry, he shouldn't apologize. By not apologizing, at the very least, he is staying true to himself. If that's the way he is, so be it. You either love him or hate him.
It's genuinely sad that this happened in the final professional game of his career. But only the ignorant will remember him for this. Those who love the game will remember him for the thrills and delight he offered up so many times, for the sheer elegance of his game and for the way teammates looked up to him.
At least, that's what I'll remember.
POST-SCRIPT
Zidane's words - -and Materazzi's response -- will hopefully put an end to this squalid affair. But there is another category of people who really should not go unpunished.
Materazzi saw his name dragged through the mud by scumbags and muckrakers with nothing better to do.
A Paris-based group called "SOS-Racism" said Materazzi called Zidane -- who is of North African descent -- a "terrorist". So-called expert lip-readers confirmed this.
Mokhtar Haddad, Zidane's cousin, told the New York Times that Materazzi called him "either a terrorist or a son of Harkis" (a reference to the Algerian revolutionaries who helped defeat France in that country's war for independence).
Others freely called Materazzi a racist and a xenophobe.
Too bad for all these supposed experts and clairvoyants that Zidane himself confirmed that Materazzi's insult was not racist in nature and that he was never called a terrorist (much less a "son of Harkis" -- as if anyone with an IQ over 60 would ever believe that Materazzi has even heard of Harkis).
Those are the people who should be apologizing to Materazzi, the people who blackened someone's name, throwing out baseless accusations, the people who -- in their frenzy to figuratively burn someone at the stake -- accused an innocent man without a shred of credible evidence (and no, those lip-readers' fantasies do not constitute credible evidence). The people who ignored Zidane's teammate and possibly the French team's most intelligent and sensitive player, Lilian Thuram (a guy who knows a thing or two about racism) when he categorically said there "was no racial slur".
The worst thing about this is that when you make a baseless accusation of racism it's like the boy who cried wolf. When you next flag up racism, people will take your words with a bucketful of salt.
I hope Materazzi sues their behinds off and donates the proceeds to organizations that are serious about fighting racism in all walks of life.
Forum Supporter
10 years of FIF
Most Important Member
FIF Special Ones
