France v Brazil

The last time these teams met in the World Cup, Zinedine Zidane took Brazil down to Chinatown, and honestly today wasn't a whole lot different. It wasn't the 3-0 anal probe the French gave them in Paris, but this does mean that in four World Cups, the only team to eliminate Brazil was France. I will be ranting more about Brazil because of all the tongues up their asses worldwide, but I'll do that once I take another look at previous World Cups. France is kind of the nightmare opponent for Brazil though, since they aren't intimidated, can match them in depth and experience, and have the star power to get calls, unlike most of Brazil's opponents (cough cough Belgium).

Brazil didn't really show much firepower in this game until the final minutes, and even then it was sparked by Ronaldo's blatant dive, falling over the grass in front of Lilian Thuram, who got the most ridiculous yellow card awarded in this tournament. I seriously thought it was on Ronaldo for diving until I saw Thuram arguing. The beautiful free kick over the bar by Ronaldinho just proves that cheaters never win, and that will be the last contribution of Ronaldo to World Cup soccer, since he's already too fat and slow at age 29. Actually maybe the yellow card that Kaka got up and demanded the ref give to Sagnol was more silly, because it reinforces the fall down then prissily mime waving the card gesture that's catching on in Europe right now.

For a lot of this game, France was really wreaking havoc on Brazil's defense, catching them in a completely disorganized state. Franck Ribery made some nice runs getting way behind their defense like the speedy little motherfucker he is, and Henry continued his usual run of offside calls. Brazil didn't have much by way of creativity on the offensive end, and France at their best in the last decade has had a curious ability to, when it looks like they're fucked, still stifle attacks and come up with clearances under pressure with a Gallic shrug. One image that will stick with me is Ronaldinho trying to maintain possession and find something to do with the ball while an immense Patrick Vieira was up against him stifling his every move and blocking out the sun.

France's goal was nice, a free kick taken by Zidane on the left, crossed all the way across the box, way over the crowd in the penalty area and everybody who rose up for it, finally dropping at the far post. There an unmarked Thierry Henry jumped up for it and kicked it into the roof of the net, up over Dida coming back across his goal. And then cocked his beret and blew smoke in Dida's face.

I knew France would castrate Brazil if they didn't blow it first. France plays Portugal in the semi-finals.

France 1-0
'57 Henry