World Cup: Match 2 - France vs. Uruguay

At 11:20am Pacific time, I slipped on my pearly white Zidane jersey and biked to the campus pub in full awareness of the irony of my garb, for I had no intention of cheering for France. In fact, I would go so far as to call my sporting of the French jersey bitterly sardonic, as I slid into my chair and eagerly awaited the next 90 minutes of French impotence. They certainly didn't disappoint. And I urge anyone who expected otherwise to watch their recent friendlies--a draw with Tunisia and a LOSS to China!--or review the past 2000 years of French hisory, which has only rarely been dotted with success and always thanks to a non-French outsider (Napolean was Corsican, Zidane Algerian, Joan d'Arc a schizophrenic woman).

I feel sorry for any fans of goal-scoring or creative play who braved watching this game, which saw a highly tactical Uruguayan side lay down a wall of five defenders that France was outright incapable of penetrating. Franck Ribery was unimpressive for the most part. Patrice Evra (captain) played the worst game of his life and quickly earned a yellow card after several frustrated attempts to disrobe his opponents after losing the ball to them. And Gourcuff is just about the worst player I've ever seen on a professional pitch. I can't believe the team had hopes he would be their next Zidane. Not only is the comparison insulting, but Samir Nasri, a creative French Algerian (like Zidane) who plays for Arsenal and definitely has the youth, fire, and tenacity of a Gunner was left at home by Raymond Domenech in what must have been an attempt to oust Diego Maradona as worst coach of the tournament.

The only thing working well for France was the Sagna-Anelka duo (Sagna crossing onto Anelka's head), which was definitely France's only chance of scoring. Unfortunately, Anelka was subbed off to make room for Henry, who I'm sorry to say is not the man he used to be. Now, I've got plenty of friends who were furious Henry was not subbed in sooner, but as far as I can tell, he is the scrub that Barcelona has pegged him as. Henry fans: give it a rest already. Henry: you should have taken a page from Zidane's book and gone out on top, with a bang.

The only thing really exciting about this game was watching Diego Forlan, who is a true professional and was the well-deserved Man of the Match. He has the killer instinct of a veteran. Like Diego Milito in the Champions League final or that brilliant Brazilian goal-scoring dinosaur Ronaldo, no matter how old they get, they can still score goals like it's nobody's business. Of course, Forlan didn't get the opportunities he needed thanks to Uruguay's defensive strategy, which was not interrupted by the injection of Nicolas Lodeira--"the playmaker"--who received a yellow card within 2 minutes of subbing in and a second for the ejection 16 minutes later. Great job there, guy! At least I'm glad to see that Uruguay eventually recognized France's feebleness and decided to go for it, though in the end I'm a little nervous I picked them to go on to the elimination round, as they didn't really offer much in terms of possessing the ball.

Group A started a toss up. And now it's even more of a toss up! But if there's one thing I'd bet on it's France three and out. Wake up, people! France is not good. France was never good. Their recent success has always hinged upon the brilliance of Zinedine Zidane, who I hope will eventually go down in the history books for being the only player to single-handedly unravel an unstoppable Brazilian side. And he did it twice! ZIDANE and HOME-FIELD ADVANTAGE won the world cup in '98 and ZIDANE ALONE almost won it in '06. Too bad the French are worthless without him. They proved it in '02 and they're proving it now. Just wait and see!

Now, for the good news. Check out this priceless
FUNNY COMMENTARY

All in the deadpan British commentator voice...

On the French team: "They're fitted with a Rolls-Royce engine but they're performing more like a go-kart."

On Gourcuff's shot that went WAAAAY wide: "Gourcuff...that nearly frightened the corner flag."

On a French corner kick late in the game: "A really poor corner... a really terrible corner."