My friend, the hair stylist, J.K.B Keyswatter sent me a text via the medium of the mobile phone, exclaiming that this was World Cup football at it's very best.
I am inclined to agree.
In a Soho pub, the Italy match was taking place downstairs in front of a packed bar. Upstairs, in a smaller room with a closed bar, the New Zealand game was showing to a small cluster (I believe that's the collective noun) of Kiwis.
To my surprise, this cluster included Strictly Come Dancing dancer, and professional New Zealander, Brendan Cole.
Brendan was to be left disappointed however, as the All Whites became the first team to be eliminated from this year's tournament without actually losing a game. In fact, the New Zealand team are now unbeaten in World Cup finals matches since 1982. But that's statistics for you.
Meanwhile, downstairs: the defending World Champions were being unceremoniously dumped out of the tournament in a game that, until they were 2-0 down, Italy seemed convinced they would win simply by being Italy.
The last twenty minutes or so were absolutely electric: the pained Italian faces at the bar were in stark contrast to the smirking English faces out on the street, as people snuck a glimpse at the score as they strolled home from work.
I just hope we're still smirking on Sunday...
A favourite moment of mine in this one, saw Gianluigi Buffon (how they missed him!) reacting in horror to Pepe's stoppage time miss. Leaping up from the bench, along with the rest of his team mates, he threw his hands to his head in shock - only for his fingers to freeze before being allowed to run through his hair.
I've made it a rule of thumb not to include video clips from this tournament but, if you get the chance, check it out. It's amazing!
Even at the point of being eliminated from the greatest show on Earth, our Luigi still managed to compose himself, clinging onto the sub-conscious realisation that if those digits entered his folical jungle, they might not have come out alive. The amount of gel would have done for them. He just couldn't risk the mess.
Some say football is far more important than life and death.
But, while the World Cup is only every four years, an Italian goalkeeper's hairstyle is for life.
Bravo Buffon's bouffant!
THE STORY SO FAR
Match of the tournament: Slovakia 3-2 Italy
Player of the tournament: Diego Forlan (Uruguay)
Goal of the tournament: Tshabalala (South Africa v Mexico)
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment