The lesson of Rob Rensenbrink and Ronaldo
When people talk about a big competition that was heavily affected by corruption, they usually refer to the Soccer World Cup held in Argentina in 1978. The military junta that was keeping the country under a state of siege, needed a big win to boost its popularity and was going to try to do everything in its power to help Argentina to win it all. The big talk is particularly about the match between Argentina and Peru, which the hosts needed to win by a margin of at least four goals in order to advance to the final. Argentina won 6-0 and made it through, and since then proof of the bribery has more or less come to light, fueled by the fact that the Peruvian keeper, Quiroga, was indeed an Argentinean.
To be honest with you, I do not know if any corruption really took place, as people say. Surely, the environmental and political conditions were such that it is quite likely that something dirty really happened. What I know for sure is that the day of the final, when all was set and ready for the celebrations to take place, one man alone almost proved to be stronger than everything. The story is known by everybody. Argentina took an early lead with a goal of the great Mario Kempes, but Dick Nanninga, who came in as a substitute for Rep, headed it in with ten more minutes to go. In the dying seconds of normal time, with the score at 1-1, Krol played a long ball in the penalty box for Rob Rensenbrink who cleaned through on goal, and hit the post! The whole Buenos Aires almost had a heart attack… It wasn't to be Holland's day though, Argentina won the game 3-1 in overtime and became champion. But had that shot been deflected just one inch, just one tiny little inch, the elegant Ducth striker would have proven himself to be bigger than General Videla, the dictatorship, the environment, the Estadio Monumental, the bribery and all the rest. Would the cup have taken the route to Amsterdam? Definitely so! No lousy colonel could have stopped it with all the money on this planet!
The point I am trying to make is that, fortunately, it is possible for a human being to dismantle something that was planned by other human beings. For an event like the World Cup, which is broadcasted live in the whole world with such a big audience, there is no way for a group of people to meet in a hidden room, around a round table, and plan the route to the final in details. As I said in my previous column, there was no conspiracy of that sort against Portugal, Italy or Spain. However, like in Argentina, this does not necessarily mean that the competition has been clean and free of suspicious situations, like some people say. And although it is true that Conceicao, Vieri and Morientes, among the others, could have secured the victory for their teams, their inability to do so does not make everything else perfectly fair. Does the fact that Rob Rensenbrink did not manage to score imply that all the rest was clean? Not at all. Does the fact that Conceicao, Vieri and Morientes did not score mean that everything in Korea is clean? Not at all either.
In the Korean side of the competition, four games were heavily affected by the officiating, in a way nobody can say that the final result was fair. I am talking about two Round of 16's, S.Korea vs. Italy and Mexico vs. USA, and the two quarterfinals, S. Korea vs. Spain and USA vs. Germany. The resulting semifinal, which happened to be one of the worse games I have ever witnessed in my life, was everything but the outcome of a fair selection. Honestly, it could have been everything but that. Obviously Spain could have played in place of South Korea. The game between the Asians and the Spaniards was quite a shame: the men in black literally handed the victory to the hosts, who hardly managed to shoot even once. Italy could have been there as well, had the ridiculous Moreno awarded a crystal clear golden goal to the Azzurri. On the other hand, in place of Germany we could have had the United States, which outplayed them in the quarterfinal and clearly deserved a penalty. I mean, if one does not get a penalty when a defender stops a ball with his hand on the goal line, when does one ever get a penalty? But the United States might not have been there as well, if a criminal volleyball-style defensive play against Mexico was not inexplicably ignored in the previous game.
What a mess, gentlemen. Mistakes from the referees have always been present, but I do not remember anything similar in a World Cup, at least in the last twenty-four years. And the weight of these decisions has been huge, because in nowadays football the games are really tight and are often decided with a one-goal lead. I mean, I heard so many praise on the magnificent Germany, the powerful Germany that advanced to the final winning three games by 1-0…but then, how can we blame Italy and Spain for their shows, when they had clear situations turned around? Especially Spain was literally robbed; I will never get tired of saying this too often.
The political pressure in Korea was huge. I could go on forever talking about how the officials were designated, how suspicious certain things and coincidences are, but I won't go further. It is enough to consider that Mr. Chung, the head of the local organizing committee and vice-president of the FIFA, will be using the fake victories of his team and all the related success to climb his way to the presidency of the Korean republic. There was as much pressure from the local government as in Argentina 1978. The important difference is that, if the past recriminations were limited to one game and the situation was confined to Argentina or Brazil, here they extend much more; God only knows who could have been in the final, had one have fair officiating. Nobody will ever know for sure what really happened or could have happened.
Now the competition is over and all the true football lovers must try to look at the good things of this event. Brazil was most of all a deserved winner, and teams like Senegal and Turkey surprised everybody with their innovative and entertaining way of playing. If they keep it that way, they can go very far in 2006. Other than that, this World Cup has really produced some of the worst spectacles ever, technically speaking. If we neglect the emotions caused by the poor officiating and the three teams I mentioned, everything was quite boring and streamlined. We have seen the suicide of powerhouses like France and Argentina, who did not manage to have their collection of stars to play better than any average second division European team. We have seen the underachievement of Portugal and Italy that, although fighting until leaving their last drop of blood on the field against a fourteen-man Korea, did not produce decent football. We have witnessed the surrender of England, their total lack of effort against a ten men Brazil. And the level of play produced by Germany was frankly quite boring. As it happened many times in the past, they went in the final as underdog in order to lose as expected.
To tell you the truth, Ronaldo has been the light in the darkness. He scored eight goals: this made the difference for his team. Let us take a look at the previous topscorers in the last thirty-two years.
1970: Gerd Müller (GER) ...........................10
1974: Grzegorz Lato (POL)...........................7
1978: Mario Kempes (ARG)............................6
1982: Paolo Rossi (ITA).............................6
1986: Gary Lineker (ENG)............................6
1990: Salvatore Schillaci (ITA).....................6
1994: Hristo Stoitchkov (BUL) & Oleg Salenko (RUS)..6
1998: Davor Suker (CRO).............................6
2002: Ronaldo (BRA).................................8
Nobody has done better than Ronaldo since Gerd Muller and he has all my sympathy, because he had the strength to achieve this result coming from a career-threatening series of injuries. Some of his goals were also quite beautiful too: his performance was remarkable. Hat off to Ronaldo.
However, this does not make a beautiful World Cup alone. I am aware that many people are quite satisfied with what they have seen, but it is also true that many others are very disappointed as well. My opinion is that important changes in many aspects will have to be made in order to return to the level that is proper to a competition of this sort. My hope is that in four years from now we will all be able to talk only about the game, without any mention to the FIFA, the local politicians or the referees. See you in Germany then, and a sincere good luck to the organizing committee: they need it.
Ciro Cerretelli for worldcuparchive.com
When people talk about a big competition that was heavily affected by corruption, they usually refer to the Soccer World Cup held in Argentina in 1978. The military junta that was keeping the country under a state of siege, needed a big win to boost its popularity and was going to try to do everything in its power to help Argentina to win it all. The big talk is particularly about the match between Argentina and Peru, which the hosts needed to win by a margin of at least four goals in order to advance to the final. Argentina won 6-0 and made it through, and since then proof of the bribery has more or less come to light, fueled by the fact that the Peruvian keeper, Quiroga, was indeed an Argentinean.
To be honest with you, I do not know if any corruption really took place, as people say. Surely, the environmental and political conditions were such that it is quite likely that something dirty really happened. What I know for sure is that the day of the final, when all was set and ready for the celebrations to take place, one man alone almost proved to be stronger than everything. The story is known by everybody. Argentina took an early lead with a goal of the great Mario Kempes, but Dick Nanninga, who came in as a substitute for Rep, headed it in with ten more minutes to go. In the dying seconds of normal time, with the score at 1-1, Krol played a long ball in the penalty box for Rob Rensenbrink who cleaned through on goal, and hit the post! The whole Buenos Aires almost had a heart attack… It wasn't to be Holland's day though, Argentina won the game 3-1 in overtime and became champion. But had that shot been deflected just one inch, just one tiny little inch, the elegant Ducth striker would have proven himself to be bigger than General Videla, the dictatorship, the environment, the Estadio Monumental, the bribery and all the rest. Would the cup have taken the route to Amsterdam? Definitely so! No lousy colonel could have stopped it with all the money on this planet!
The point I am trying to make is that, fortunately, it is possible for a human being to dismantle something that was planned by other human beings. For an event like the World Cup, which is broadcasted live in the whole world with such a big audience, there is no way for a group of people to meet in a hidden room, around a round table, and plan the route to the final in details. As I said in my previous column, there was no conspiracy of that sort against Portugal, Italy or Spain. However, like in Argentina, this does not necessarily mean that the competition has been clean and free of suspicious situations, like some people say. And although it is true that Conceicao, Vieri and Morientes, among the others, could have secured the victory for their teams, their inability to do so does not make everything else perfectly fair. Does the fact that Rob Rensenbrink did not manage to score imply that all the rest was clean? Not at all. Does the fact that Conceicao, Vieri and Morientes did not score mean that everything in Korea is clean? Not at all either.
In the Korean side of the competition, four games were heavily affected by the officiating, in a way nobody can say that the final result was fair. I am talking about two Round of 16's, S.Korea vs. Italy and Mexico vs. USA, and the two quarterfinals, S. Korea vs. Spain and USA vs. Germany. The resulting semifinal, which happened to be one of the worse games I have ever witnessed in my life, was everything but the outcome of a fair selection. Honestly, it could have been everything but that. Obviously Spain could have played in place of South Korea. The game between the Asians and the Spaniards was quite a shame: the men in black literally handed the victory to the hosts, who hardly managed to shoot even once. Italy could have been there as well, had the ridiculous Moreno awarded a crystal clear golden goal to the Azzurri. On the other hand, in place of Germany we could have had the United States, which outplayed them in the quarterfinal and clearly deserved a penalty. I mean, if one does not get a penalty when a defender stops a ball with his hand on the goal line, when does one ever get a penalty? But the United States might not have been there as well, if a criminal volleyball-style defensive play against Mexico was not inexplicably ignored in the previous game.
What a mess, gentlemen. Mistakes from the referees have always been present, but I do not remember anything similar in a World Cup, at least in the last twenty-four years. And the weight of these decisions has been huge, because in nowadays football the games are really tight and are often decided with a one-goal lead. I mean, I heard so many praise on the magnificent Germany, the powerful Germany that advanced to the final winning three games by 1-0…but then, how can we blame Italy and Spain for their shows, when they had clear situations turned around? Especially Spain was literally robbed; I will never get tired of saying this too often.
The political pressure in Korea was huge. I could go on forever talking about how the officials were designated, how suspicious certain things and coincidences are, but I won't go further. It is enough to consider that Mr. Chung, the head of the local organizing committee and vice-president of the FIFA, will be using the fake victories of his team and all the related success to climb his way to the presidency of the Korean republic. There was as much pressure from the local government as in Argentina 1978. The important difference is that, if the past recriminations were limited to one game and the situation was confined to Argentina or Brazil, here they extend much more; God only knows who could have been in the final, had one have fair officiating. Nobody will ever know for sure what really happened or could have happened.
Now the competition is over and all the true football lovers must try to look at the good things of this event. Brazil was most of all a deserved winner, and teams like Senegal and Turkey surprised everybody with their innovative and entertaining way of playing. If they keep it that way, they can go very far in 2006. Other than that, this World Cup has really produced some of the worst spectacles ever, technically speaking. If we neglect the emotions caused by the poor officiating and the three teams I mentioned, everything was quite boring and streamlined. We have seen the suicide of powerhouses like France and Argentina, who did not manage to have their collection of stars to play better than any average second division European team. We have seen the underachievement of Portugal and Italy that, although fighting until leaving their last drop of blood on the field against a fourteen-man Korea, did not produce decent football. We have witnessed the surrender of England, their total lack of effort against a ten men Brazil. And the level of play produced by Germany was frankly quite boring. As it happened many times in the past, they went in the final as underdog in order to lose as expected.
To tell you the truth, Ronaldo has been the light in the darkness. He scored eight goals: this made the difference for his team. Let us take a look at the previous topscorers in the last thirty-two years.
1970: Gerd Müller (GER) ...........................10
1974: Grzegorz Lato (POL)...........................7
1978: Mario Kempes (ARG)............................6
1982: Paolo Rossi (ITA).............................6
1986: Gary Lineker (ENG)............................6
1990: Salvatore Schillaci (ITA).....................6
1994: Hristo Stoitchkov (BUL) & Oleg Salenko (RUS)..6
1998: Davor Suker (CRO).............................6
2002: Ronaldo (BRA).................................8
Nobody has done better than Ronaldo since Gerd Muller and he has all my sympathy, because he had the strength to achieve this result coming from a career-threatening series of injuries. Some of his goals were also quite beautiful too: his performance was remarkable. Hat off to Ronaldo.
However, this does not make a beautiful World Cup alone. I am aware that many people are quite satisfied with what they have seen, but it is also true that many others are very disappointed as well. My opinion is that important changes in many aspects will have to be made in order to return to the level that is proper to a competition of this sort. My hope is that in four years from now we will all be able to talk only about the game, without any mention to the FIFA, the local politicians or the referees. See you in Germany then, and a sincere good luck to the organizing committee: they need it.
Ciro Cerretelli for worldcuparchive.com
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