Zidane always state in his interviews that his favourite player when he was young was Enzo Francescoli, the former Uruguaian player. I always wondered why? That time, yes Enzo was so talented, but Maradona, Platini, Basten, Zico got most of the attention.
Anyhow, Francescoli had some of great moments like this one
and Here are some more goals for Enzo. However, Enzo was very creative in the midfield and he had great imagination and unpredictable passes, and I think this made Zidane liked him. This video shows Enzo skills in the final of 1986 Libertadoros cup.
What's more interesting, that Zidane named his son as Enzo after his favourite player Enzo Francescoli. Now the little Enzo is 15 years old and in the verge of playing for France or Spain under 16 team. Watch this video for clips of Zidane Son. You can see from the clips that he likes to imitate his father.
The first two goals are special, they were in a friendly vs. Czech republic in 1994 in Bordoux, where he used to play at that time.
Czech was leading 2-0 till the middle of the second half. Zizou came out of the bench to start his international career. In few minutes, he scored a wonderful goal. With the closing minute of the game, he scored the equalizer.
I cannot resist putting bonus material : ) (all bonuses are short videos)
Even if you aren't a football fan, you must have seen the picture in the left for Zizo headbutt. If you follow football daily, you might heard about Totti disgusting tackle and red card yesterday. But, almost no one knows the picture in the bottom. It is one of the funniest / ugliest incidents in Saudi league involving Rivelino (in white shirt) almost 28 years ago.
Totti red card:
This tackle was yesterday in the Italian cup final of Inter-Roma (1-0). The other player was Mario Balotelli, an Italian striker originally from Ghana famous by Super Mario. God only knows what did he do or say to Totti, who is 14 years older than him. Not that Totti record is clean, but Balotelli record is so dirty. He just had a bad incident in the Semi Final vs. Barca two weeks ago. He gave a finger to Inter fans and threw his shirt in the ground. Matterazzi attacked him in the player tunnel that created so much criticism on Inter.
Rivelino red card:
Now, let's go 28 years ago, almost in 1978 or 1979 to Saudi field, in a game between Hilal and Ittihad, and let's watch the chase:
For clarification, Rivo (as Saudis used to call him) is in the white shirt chasing "Saad Break", a right back from Ittihad in the yellow one.
Now, let me analyze that: - Zizo headbutt: press kept speculating a lot on what Matterazzi said to Zizo. Matterazzi had a black history, and a black future before/after this headbutt. So, apprantly, he said something too aweful to Zizo.
- Totti red card: Baletolli is following his teammate Matterazzi steps in the good manners. He might have said something to Totti that made him retaliate.
- Rivo: Rivo didn't speak English or Arabic. "Saad Break" didn't speak Portugese nor English. There is no way that they both had a conversation of any kind. This leaves with only one communication possibility "Body Language" :)
For the record, Rivo played next to Pele in 1970 scoring 3 goals to win the world cup. He gave the famous pass in the final to Pele. He played in 1974 and 1978 WCs and scored 3 more goals and was a clean player overall. (unlike Zidane and Totti who got a decent record of red cards).
What happened next? Not sure if this incident happened in the same game, or after, but Rivo did a bad tackle to the exact same player. He was banned for few months on the local league after that, despite the fact he was playing to the most powerful team, that people think the soccer federation favors him.
It was a friendly game in France in last November (2009) where Zidane played in a charity game of "Variety Clubs" in France vs. Amiens. A very interesting moment came: a free kick, and Zizo will kick it. He scored it.
Now, all of this could be normal. Well, the goal was wonderful one. Zizo scored it in a style, in a beautiful way, dailymail called it a "wonder free kick".
When I went to the YouTube to watch it, I smiled a lot, and here what is not normal:
The game was not broadcasted or recorded in TV. I found so many clips from the net, so many very clear great quality clips. All of them were by camera fans. They were from almost all angles of the field. The fans had so much trust that Zizo is still Zizo. They went to the YouTube and shared it in the next day or so. It was more than three years after his retirement.
Those were the ones that were shared on YouTube. I wonder how many more clips, were recorded and not shared?
After filtering them, I am sharing here seven of these clips
and here are four more videos from four different fans, each with excellent quality, a different flavour of Zidane goal:
The picture of this blog is one of my favorites featuring an important moment in 2006 final, Zidane scoring his famous penalty against the best keeper in the world, that time, Gianluigi Buffon.
So much were written about this particular penalty and how great that penalty was. One of the Scottish players and a BBC bloggers desribed it as: "Surely, given the circumstances, there cannot have been a more confident penalty than that in the history of the game.".
There is so much that was going to in my head during that moment, and so much to say more about this penalty:
- Zizo had perfect record in PKs: Missing a PK became a norm for the super-stars in the modern football. The list is long and includes very impressive names: Maradona, Platini, Socrates, Zico, Marco Van Basten, Beckham, Raul, Mathause, Roberto Baggio, Franco Barezi, Igor Belanov and the list is too long, but, in contrast
Zidane had 7 crucial penalties in his career, all of them with France, 4 in European Cups and 3 in World Cups, and his record was a perfect one: scoring seven penalties out of seven penalties. Something impressive that is very rare to happen in modern history. It is something to tell about Zidane: He got the nervs and confidence of a football champ.
I searched so much, I only found one penalty missed by Zidane, that was prior to 2006 WC friendly against China, and it was when he slipped while taking the PK, so we should not count it. First, it had no importance at all, second, it was a funny accident:
- Best player in the world vs. Best keeper in the world: When I was watching, I told my friends, Zizo will sure kick to the right side of Buffon (left side of Zizo). I was wrong??!! Not exactly, Buffon had the same thought as mine as well. Whenever I thought about it, I always thought that Buffon took the right decision, and Zidane did the right decision, both in selecting which side of the goal to focus on.
Let me explain.
Before that moment, Zidane took six crucial PKs in his life, let's review them: 1- France x Holland in Euro 1996 Quarter Final: Zidane took the first PK to give France 5-4 victory Zidane kicked it to the right side of the keeper
2- France x czech in Euro 1996 Semi Final: Zidane took the first PK and scored it, but france lost 5-6 and was knocked out. Zidane kicked it to the right side of the keeper, I could not find a video for this penalty.
3- France x Italy in 1998 WC Quarter Final: (check at 03:26 minutes) Zidane again took the first PK and scored it, exactly, to the right side of the keeper. France qualified to the semi final with 4-3 victory
4- Next, two years later, in Zidane best game ever (in my opinion) vs. Portugal in the Euro 2000 Semi Final.
After an amazing tough game, Zidane had to take a penalty at the extra time and during the "Death Goal" years. It was tremendous pressure moment. Zizo never looked more confident, he scored it,
Zizo did his routine again, his right foot to the right side of the keeper. Well, England had a bad keeper, so we might expect a lot of him.
But, the sixth crucial penalty is different:
6- France x Portugal in 2006 WC Semi Final:
Zidane did it again, with exactly same way. But, now, it was a wonderful smart Portoguese keeper. He had big role in Portugal qualifying to the Semi Final and he was able to read Zizo mind. Ricardo almost saved the penalty.
7- Now, we reach the seventh important penalty in Zizo career. At that moment, he is facing one of the smartest and most competent keepers in the history of the game, Buffon. Zizo scored all of his famous six penalties the same way, to the right side of the keeper.
Is he willing to change his style?
I think, Buffon did his right guess, taking the game of chances, he jumped to the right side.
Zidane did right decision too, he changed his style, he knew he didn't need the power this time, as he usually did in the past. But, he needed the smartness.
Zizo penalty in the final of the last mondial, was much more than a PK, it had so much history and characters behind it. I have to add something weird, considering he is my favorite ever player, and so much wow said about that PK:
I liked Zizo decision (changing the side), but I didn't like his way of taking the PK. In such an important game, I think style and art is not what we need. What is needed is precise power and focus to score. I think it was bit careless, that he might missed it.
"I have spent some time wiht Arsen Wenger and Alex Ferguson, watching their training. It's speed, speed, speed. The mentality is to go at high speed all the time. I'm talking about training. In the matches you can se eit, but in training I have also seen unbelievable speed ........................ I was in Barcelona and I saw the under-17 team play a game in training against the first team. I didn't see any difference. 17 years old players from Barcelona with perfect technique, perfect position, perfect speed." National Germany team coach Goachim Low in interview with World Soccer, summer 2009
"As I see football, the easier and simpler, the better"
Pep Gardiola
"Capello told me to watch videos of Van Basten's goals and study everything about him, movement, finishing, timing, the lot, and score the same goals" Zlatan Ibrahimovic
"Brazil are a really good, team, the strongest in the world - better than Spain - with a really good technique and pace but also really strong physically. You could see it with every tackle, every time they were one against one. " Capello after England lost a friendly to Brazil 0-1 last September.
"Even if I had to play with ten men, I would not have him back. Every coach comes up against one unmanageable player in their career. For me, it was Mido" Leo Beenhakker when he was a coach of Ajax.
"He was untouchable. He's not even that big, but he was so strong. I swear he had glue on his boot. I would make a tackle and think I'd won the ball, nad he'd keep it, with me looking an Idiot" Nicky Butt, Manchester United player who was marking Zizou in the famous 1999 Champion League SF against Juventus.
"I went off the rail and I regret it. I was insulted, mocked and I reacted badly" Zidane at 1993 after a red card with Bordeaux against Marseille.
"I have changed, I know there's no more room for illegal knee-jerk reactions at this level of the competition any more. If I do the same thing at the World Cup, there will be serious consequences" Zidane after stamping a Finnish player in a friendly at 5 June, 1998, few days prior to the world cup. He only got a yellow card. (13 days later, Zizou got red card in a WC game against Saudi Arabia)
"We always talk about the retaliation. It obviously has to be punished. What I did can't be pardoned. But, if there is no provocation, there is no retaliation. The guilty party is the person who provokes the incident". Zidane after 2006 WC final.
Zidane always state in his interviews that his favourite player when he was young was Enzo Francescoli, the former Uruguaian player. I always wondered why? That time, yes Enzo was so talented, but Maradona, Platini, Basten, Zico got most of the attention.
