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Brazil, France on Cup collision
course
Posted: Wed July 8,
1998
Sports Illustrated soccer writer Grant Wahl has been
answering your World Cup questions throughout the
tournament.
MARSEILLE—Heading into the finals, here's my World
Cup edition of "Who's Hot/Who's Not."
Enjoy.
WHO'S HOT
Bebeto,
Brazil
Why is this guy getting whistled at by the Brazilian fans?
With three goals, he is one of the Cup's top scorers, and
his goal against Denmark was a thing of
beauty.
Rivaldo,
Brazil
The smoothest player in yellow. I've seen 10,000 soccer
billboards since I got here, and none of them have featured
Rivaldo. Why
not?
Lilian Thuram/Marcel Desailly,
France
If Les Bleus didn't have these guys on defense, they
wouldn't still be
around.
Davor Suker,
Croatia
Kind of a flake, but he never, ever stops
attacking.
Dennis Bergkamp,
Holland
Came back from injury at just the right time. Smoothest
scorer in the
tournament.
Edgar Davids,
Holland
Gifted attacking midfielder was the Dutch engine for most
of the
tournament.
WHO'S NOT
Ed van der Sar, Holland/Ariel Ortega,
Argentina
Their unfortunate quarterfinal mini-rumble had all the
authenticity of a pro wrestling cage
match.
Lothar Matthaus,
Germany
Blaming the referee for a 3-0 loss only makes him look like
a sore
loser.
Youri Djorkaeff,
France
Quit taking dives and try to put a shot on goal for
once.
I'd love to regale you with fun stories from the past week,
but I seem to have caught something resembling the bubonic
plague. Perhaps the problem is that I had no comprehension
of how long this tournament actually lasts. It's 32 days,
if you really
want to know, or twice as long as the Olympics with a lot more
traveling involved. I know, I know, I'll have some
wonderful memories, so that one day I can return to
Marseille and tell my five-year-old: "Son, that's the
stadium where I saw Bergkamp's
90th-minute goal against Argentina. And that's the restaurant
where I barfed my brains out the same day.
Don't order the
hamburger."
I think it's time for
questions:
Why is nobody speaking of Rivaldo? To me he seems to be as
skillful, if not better than
Ronaldo.
—Saril Kumar, Santa Clara,
Calif.
Good question. Not that Ronaldo has had a bad
tournament—just look at the two goals he set up
against Denmark and his goal against Holland in the
semifinals—but Rivaldo has been Brazil's best
offensive player. What's odd, actually, is how the two
players have in effect switched their normal positions in this
World Cup.
Rivaldo is supposed to be the playmaking midfielder and
Ronaldo the pure scorer, not the other way
around. Yet how many times have you seen Ronaldo trek far back
into the midfield for a ball, while Rivaldo always seems to
be in front of the opposing team's
goal?
Do you believe that U.S. Soccer's 2010 project can produce
the same level of players that result from the European
club systems or from cultures where the average person's
first passion is soccer—like
Brazil?
—David Hanks, Fort Collins,
Colo.
I know I said I'd give the 2010 project a chance, but right
now
I think the U.S. has a better chance of landing someone on
Jupiter in 2010 than it does of winning the World
Cup. There's just not enough natural incentive to develop
players like the clubs do in Europe and Latin America, and
not enough interest in soccer among U.S. kids to make it
work.
My SI colleague
Steve
Rushin has a good idea: Why pussyfoot around with naturalizing
one or two foreigners like
David
Regis before the Cup and instead set about finding all the
soccer players in the world with remote U.S. connections
and making them citizens? If we look really hard, there
must be some great ones—and if there aren't, we can
marry them to some Americans.
Maybe that way the U.S. could win a World Cup, stir interest in
the States, and use
that to build a powerhouse of native-born Yanks. After this
year's wretched performance, I'm willing to try
anything.
What is your comment on the refereeing standards at the
World Cup so far? Would you subscribe to the thought that
in the future, the World Cup organizing committees should
only consider bringing in referees from countries that have
not qualified, to avoid partisan
influences?
—John Mthetwa, Lusaka,
Zambia
Now there's a brilliant idea, John. Instead of using the
best referees in the world (who presumably come from the
best leagues), we should use refs only from soccer
backwaters that don't qualify for the Cup. That way, every
game could be like the
Italy-Chile first-round game, in which the referee from Niger
(Niger!) blew the penalty call that gave Italy an
undeserved
draw.
Let the record show that I think the officiating has been
pretty decent overall, but it could be
better. What FIFA should do is take the opposite of your
suggestion and use more than one ref from each country,
which is all that the current rules will allow. I'd much
rather have five referees each from Italy, Argentina and
Germany than the current crop
from places like the United Arab Emirates and
Australia.
By the way, I don't know what you do for a living, but you
could have a bright future in FIFA
administration.
What are the chances of the U.S. pursuing Franz Beckenbauer
to be the next coach of the national
team?
—Michael Byorini, South Bend,
Ind.
According to U.S. Soccer president
Alan
Rothenberg, anyone and everyone is still on his list of candidates.
In reality, any prospective coach will see that
the U.S. could be looking at some lean years in the near
future, and I don't think Beckenbauer would want any part of
that.
It seems like the U.S. had a better team four years ago
before the MLS came along. Do you think that the MLS has
improved the U.S. national team, or do you think the U.S.
players are used to a lower level of intensity than is
expected in international
games?
—Chad Brubaker,
Atlanta
It's pretty widely accepted that the MLS has hurt the U.S.
national team's standard of play. You get better by playing
against better players, and the national team players are
the best MLS has to offer. Not that I'm anti-MLS. I think
the U.S. needs to
have a first-division league, but I also realize that it has
a negative effect on our international lineup.
Eddie
Pope, for example, would be much better off if he were
developing in Italy, as would
Brian Maisonneuve
or
Brian
McBride or any other young
American.
Don't you think that soccer has the need to change some
rules for the World Cup? I mean the penalty kicks after the
extra two 15 minute periods. It is an ugly way to lose a
game. What about "opening up" the benches with
unlimited substitutes in overtime until one team
scores?
—Ernesto Depetrini. Torino,
Italy
I expected to get this question from an Italian. (Italy,
after all, has gone out on penalties in the last three
World Cups.) So I asked FIFA head spokesman
Keith
Cooper if he would ever consider your scenario about letting play
continue indefinitely.
"Impossible!" he
said. So there's your answer. I agree with you, though. Let them
play till they drop, with or without your idea about
opening up the benches. I can think of no better incentive
to put the ball in the
net.
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