It’s Final, France Wins
It is too much, obviously, to expect one World Cup to produce two great semifinals. What France and Portugal offered here Wednesday night was a pale reflection of the drama that Italy and Germany had provided 24 hours earlier. That semifinal had electricity, it had tension, it had quality. This one had very little.
In the end, the French prevailed, making a Zinedine Zidane penalty kick goal in the 33rd minute stand up for a 1-0 victory over the Portuguese and thus earning France a place in Sunday night’s final against Italy in Berlin.
The Italians will not be quaking in their soccer boots.
The drab and lackluster game produced few moments of excitement, and the closest there was to any real emotion came after the final whistle when angry Portugal Coach Luiz Felipe Scolari, a Brazilian, had to be physically restrained from going after Uruguayan referee Jorge Larrionda and his assistants.
Scolari’s 12-game unbeaten run in World Cup play -- as coach of Brazil in 2002 and Portugal in 2006 -- came to an end. That was enough to upset him, but what he really was furious about were the calls that consistently seemed to go against his players, including the call that led to Zidane’s penalty kick.
Later, Scolari had calmed down and accepted defeat. “It was a deserved victory, definitely, for France,” he said. “There are situations that are difficult. We did everything we could. We did our best. We have to accept this.”
There was nothing blatantly wrong with the officiating. Even the penalty call, while marginal, could not be seriously argued.
France striker Thierry Henry made a run across the top of the penalty area to the left of the net. Portugal defender Ricardo Carvalho tried to tackle the ball away but instead caught Henry on the shin.
Henry, the Arsenal star, has not scored the hundreds of goals that he has without knowing what to do in such situations. He went down as if his legs had vanished, arms flailing. Very theatrical.
Larrionda pointed immediately to the penalty spot and Zidane stepped up to fire the ball into the lower left corner, off goalkeeper Ricardo’s fingertips. It was Zidane’s 30th goal for France in 107 international appearances.
That was all that was noteworthy in the first 45 minutes.
In the second half, Ricardo saw a Henry shot dribble beneath him, but the ball deflected wide of the left post. The keeper then did well to hold onto a searing drive from Frank Ribery, the most committed and lively of the French players. At the other end, Portugal striker Pauleta took a fierce shot on the turn only to see the ball slam into the side netting.
Then 15 minutes or so from the end, France’s Fabien Barthez, who has a history of goalkeeping eccentricities, made a blunder that almost gifted the Portuguese the tying goal.
Cristiano Ronaldo, who was booed constantly by non-Portuguese fans whenever he touched the ball -- a reaction, perhaps, to his run-in with England’s Wayne Rooney in the quarterfinals -- sent a free kick into the goal area.
Barthez, instead of simply catching the ball, made a scooping, two-handed motion for it and succeeded only in pushing it up into the air, like a volleyball setter.
Portugal’s Luis Figo was lurking nearby and got his head to the ball, but his aim was poor and instead of spiking it into the net, he put it over the crossbar.
Figo clutched his head in his hands afterward. He knew that a chance that good probably wouldn’t come again.
It didn’t. Portugal applied some more intense pressure in the final minutes, including sending Ricardo near France’s goal to add an extra attacker, but it was too little too late.
Said Henry: “After we got the penalty, the way we defended was great.”
Ronaldo said he was “not bothered” by the booing, and also ventured where Scolari had chosen not to tread.
“I don’t think the referee was fair,” Ronaldo said. “There were a lot of fouls that deserved a yellow card that he didn’t give.”
French fans in the crowd of 66,000 gave loud voice to their feelings. The old guard had achieved what few of the fans had thought possible.
Six players on the French roster -- Zidane, Henry, Barthez, Patrick Vieira, Lilian Thuram and David Trezeguet -- are holdovers from the 1998 team that won the World Cup when France hosted the tournament.
“I am 34, and I feel like a 10-year-old child,” Thuram said. “We’re in the final and I hope that the party is going to continue because this is just too beautiful.”
France Coach Raymond Domenech already is demanding more than just an appearance by his team on Sunday, in a final that will be Zidane’s last game before retiring.
“We have to go all the way,” the coach said. “We cannot just be satisfied with the fact that getting there is wonderful.”
The only down note for France was the yellow card earned by substitute striker Louis Saha that will cause him to be suspended for Sunday’s game.
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(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX)
First look
A preview of the World Cup championship game:
MATCHUP: Italy vs. France, Sunday at Berlin, 11 a.m. PDT, Ch. 7, 34.
* OFFENSE: After sputtering in the first two games of group play, France hit its stride when veteran midfielder Zinedine Zidane, who will retire after Sunday’s game, began to play as he did in his prime. Striker Thierry Henry leads France with three goals and is one of the world’s most prolific scorers, but has been erratic. More impressive has been Frank Ribery, whose tireless sideline runs have energized the French. Italy starts Luca Toni, the leading scorer in the Italian League, at striker, but in most games their goals have come elsewhere. Like France, Italy has a standout playmaker in the midfield in Francesco Totti.
* DEFENSE: No nation has a greater reputation on defense than Italy, which has surpassed itself this time by giving up only one goal in six games, and that was an own goal against the United States. Gianluigi Buffon is on most experts’ short list for the best goalkeeper in the world, and Fabio Cannavaro stood out on defense in the semifinal shutout of Germany. Buffon’s counterpart, Fabian Barthez, has given the French some nervous moments, but is a veteran of the 1998 World Cup championship team. He plays behind two of the world’s top defenders in Lilian Thuram and William Gallas.
* COACHING: Marcelo Lippi made his name during two tours of duty with Italian powerhouse Juventus. After he took over the national team in July 2004, Italy lost two of its first four games, but is unbeaten in 24 games since then. France’s Raymond Domenech has been anything but universally loved, particularly by the French media, but most of his moves have proved the right ones at the World Cup, starting with the controversial choice of Barthez as his goalkeeper.
* HISTORY: Italy has the greater World Cup pedigree with three championships, in 1934, ’38 and ‘82, but France’s one title came more recently, in 1998, with the help of six members of the current team. The teams have split four meetings in the World Cup, two of which occurred in France: a 3-1 Italian victory in the 1938 quarterfinals, and a penalty-kick shootout decision for France after a scoreless tie in the 1998 quarterfinals. Their most recent meeting was in the Euro 2000 championship game, with France winning, 2-1, in overtime.
* RULED OUT: Louis Saha, a reserve forward for France, is the only player ineligible to play in the final, after picking up his second yellow card Wednesday.
VAN NIGHTINGALE
