By David C. Watson Jul 10, 2006, 16:46 GMT
It is with more than a tinge of regret that we’re all gathering here around the flat screen to watch the denouement of 2006. The World Cup is a marker point in life, sort of like the time you notice the first fluff of pubic hair, the initial gulp of an underage pint or that defining moment when you lump somebody and your hand swells up for days afterwards.
David Campbell Watson hails from Edinburgh in Scotland and runs a multi-media consultancy in Los Angeles. A proud supporter of the fabulous Heart of Midlothian Football Club, David is happily married to Susie who by no fault of her own is English.
The first one I truly remember was 1974 and that was in Germany as well – West Germany as it was then. A tournament marked by Gerd Muller, that Cruyff turn and probably the best national side Scotland has ever put on a football pitch. My father was at the Brazil game and despite an innate intelligence, never came to grips with how Bremner managed to miss that chance from one yard out. We’re still the only nation to bow out of the beautiful game’s premier tournament unbeaten and that, unfortunately, sums up Scotland’s lot. Glorious failure is an art we’ve perfected. There used to be a real swagger about our national team, buoyed by an ability to field a side that stood tall with any of the “continentals” and the fact that qualification for major tournaments was a given.
Looking back, ’74 was our finest hour. After that, it was downhill all the way. Universal derision for the squad of ’78, led by the deceased clown Ally McLeod, was followed by a comical exit in 1982 when Willie Miller and Alan Hansen combined in a classic pincer movement and ran into each other, allowing the USSR to score and put us out again. But we still hold dear the memory of Dave Narey’s wonder “toe-poke” against the Brazilians. Altogether now, “We hate Jimmy Hill, he’s a poof, he’s a poof.” 1986 was wee Gordon barely clearing the advertising hoardings after scoring against the Germans and a disgraceful display from Uruguay that should have seen them banned from international competition for all eternity.
1990 gave us Costa Rica and despite the fact that many of my friends rave about the country, I wouldn’t be seen dead there. Pathetic I know, but it still hurts. The final hurrah was 1998 with the honor of the opening game against - you’ve guessed it - Brazil. 60,000 Scots in Paris and then the hapless Tom Boyd goes and ruins a perfect day. Now we’re the also-rans, with a FIFA ranking of 59, one below Zambia and just above Uzbekistan. Our reward for all these years of total underachievement is a qualifying group for Euro 2008 that includes Italy, France and Ukraine. Ouch.
This was a great weekend of football. Germany made a mockery of the general idea that third place means nothing by stuffing the cynical Portuguese and virtually ensuring, through the derision of the crowd, that Christiano Ronaldo will never play club football in the UK again. He may be buff and a wizard at the step over but by falling over every available blade of grass, he fully justified a burgeoning reputation as an insufferable little cheat. The final was all it should be. With a background worthy of an episode of the Sopranos including widespread corruption, racial undertones and personal redemption, Italy and France fought each other to a standstill. And in one compelling moment of madness, football cemented its claim as the ultimate theater.
We’ll probably never know what Materazzi said to Zidane just after tweaking his nipple, but it must have been something particularly heinous for a man of such renowned reserve to react in the way that he did, just three minutes from bringing the curtain down on one of the game’s most distinguished careers and within touching distance of the greatest prize. As ignominious exits go, it bears comparison with the historical greats and at that moment, shorn of their talisman, France lost the World Cup final. In a delicious twist, and as he no doubt sat in the dressing room thinking “what have I just done?”, Zizou then walked away with the Golden Ball award for man of the tournament. Voting closed at halftime and I swear you could hear the great and the good of FIFA squelching in their own embarrassment after the announcement.
So South Africa 2010 here we come and a growing realization that by the time it starts, I’ll have stumbled into real middle age with little idea of how I actually got there. Come on, join in with the chorus – “we’re on the march wi’ Walter’s Army.”
Cheers all.
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