What in the World They Are Saying
Tuning in to the world’s game, here are just a few of the comments that have been voiced in recent days:
* From Pele, in a tribute to Didi, a World Cup winner with Brazil in 1958 and 1962 and the first player to score a goal at Rio de Janeiro’s famed Maracana Stadium, who died at 71:
“Didi was very important for me in 1958. I was only 17 and he was like an older brother. For him, playing football was as easy as peeling an orange.”
* From Mohamed Al Fayed, owner of London’s famed Harrod’s department store and chairman of Fulham, newly promoted to the English Premier League, offering to save Wembley Stadium:
“Wembley must be preserved as the historical monument of English football so that major games can again be played there. . . . To even think about knocking it down, to demolish the twin towers, is sheer madness.”
* From Lennart Johansson, the Swedish president of UEFA, European soccer’s governing body:
“There has been justified criticism of the fact that there is too much football on television. Too much isn’t good for anybody. We can’t carry on like this.”
* From Brazilian Rene Simoes, who coached Jamaica to the France ’98 World Cup, after being appointed technical director of Trinidad and Tobago’s national team on Thursday in a move aimed at salvaging its World Cup 2002 qualifying hopes:
“It will not be an easy task, but there are seven matches remaining and, while the USA is way out front, the other teams are not beyond the reach of Trinidad and Tobago.”
* From Joseph “Sepp” Blatter, the embattled president of FIFA, talking in Colombo, Sri Lanka, about the expense of the 2002 World Cup, to be jointly staged by Japan and South Korea:
“There will be very little money left over in the end.”
* From former FIFA referee Leslie Mottram, commenting on the newly opened Shizuoka Stadium in Japan, built at a cost of $245 million for next year’s World Cup:
“Certainly, it compared very favorably with the World Cup stadiums in America, and the field was good. The only thing I didn’t like was the running track, because you lose a bit of the atmosphere. I think the fans like to see the whites of the players’ eyes and the emotions on their faces, but you miss this when there’s a running track.”
* From Brazilian striker Elber, whose Bayern Munich club can win its first European Cup and German Bundesliga championship double since 1974 if it defeats Valencia of Spain in Milan, Italy, on Wednesday:
“If we lose, the club should consider selling the 11 players who were on the pitch, because if we don’t make it this time, we’ll never make it.”
* From Peru Coach Julio Cesar Uribe, responding to the possibility that the team’s next World Cup qualifier, against Ecuador, might be moved out of the country after Peruvian fans stoned Chile’s team bus before a previous match in Lima:
“Even if we have to play on the moon, we will try to win just the same.”
* From Tetsuya Murakami, spokesman for Japan’s 2002 World Cup Organizing Committee
(JAWOC), on transportation headaches:
“Access is a big issue because some of the stadiums have been built in rural areas. We are discussing how to handle the spectators, how to organize shuttle buses from the nearest [train] station, and restricting the use of private cars to the stadium.”
* From Frenchman Gerard Houllier, who coached Liverpool to a unique trio of cup triumphs this season, winning the English League Cup, the English F.A. Cup and, in a dramatic 5-4 overtime victory over Alaves of Spain in Dortmund, Germany last Wednesday, the UEFA Cup:
“I told the players they were playing for the history of this great club and they’ve done it because we hadn’t won a European trophy in 17 years.
“But they’ve also won themselves a place in history. A final like this, with nine goals, doesn’t happen every day and it will be remembered for a long time.”
* From British Prime Minister Tony Blair, describing Liverpool’s victory:
“It was a great match, but a bit of a nail biter.”
* From Gonzalo Anton, president of Alaves, the Basque club that reached the final of a European cup competition for the first time in its 80-year history, only to be narrowly beaten.
“We touched the heavens.”
Quick Passes
Philippe Troussier, the Frenchman who led Japan to its Asian Cup victory in Lebanon last October and to the quarterfinals of the Olympic Games in Sydney, was named coach of the year by the Asian Football Confederation (AFC), the first non-Asian to receive the award. . . . Moroccan King Mohammed VI has ruled that his country will be a candidate to host the World Cup in 2010, the royal palace said in a statement.
Celtic’s Swedish striker, Henrik Larsson, was named Scotland’s player of the year after his 51 goals led the club to the Scottish Premier League championship and the Scottish League Cup and into next Saturday’s final of the Scottish F.A. Cup. . . . Francisco Maturana, who led Colombia to the 1990 and 1994 World Cup tournaments, has returned as national team coach, replacing Luis Augusto Garcia, who resigned after Colombia was tied, 2-2, in a qualifying game by lowly Venezuela.
The Asian Football Confederation banned 16 players from international soccer for two years after X-rays at last year’s Asian under-16 Championship proved some of them were 19 or 20 years old. The players were from Iran, Oman, Thailand, Nepal and Bangladesh. . . . Traditional rivals Greece and Turkey have agreed to make a joint bid to stage the 2008 European Championship.
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FIFA Rankings
For the first time since 1994, Brazil has been replaced at the top of FIFA’s ranking of its 203 national teams. Reigning world and European champion France has taken over the top spot.
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Rank Prev. Country Pts. 1 2 France 796 2 1 Brazil 794 3 3 Argentina 763 4 4 Italy 748 5 5 Portugal 732 6 7 Spain 724 7 6 Czech Republic 722 8 10 Netherlands 715 9 8 Germany 711 10 9 Paraguay 703 11 11 Yugoslavia 689 12 12 Romania 683 13 13 Mexico 680 14 14 England 673 15 18 United States 666 16 15 Colombia 665 17 16 Norway 663 18 20 Russia 652 19 17 Croatia 650 20 21 Denmark 645
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