A Game for Galacticos

Figo & Zidane: two galacticos, two different soccer fortunes, one game for the chance to play for the World Cup title. Oh, and a pig's head, too.


In 2000, Real Madrid's newly elected president, Florentino Perez, signed one of the best players in the world, Luis Figo. While the news of Real Madrid acquiring a top player is about as noteworthy as the New York Knicks acquiring a crappy, overpaid one, this signing was different: Figo played for Barcelona, Madrid's arch-rival. When Real Madrid returned to Barcelona the following season with Figo in their classic all-white strip, public enemy number one was treated to a welcome normally reserved for George Bush in Tehran. Objects rained down upon Figo from all angles, from a bottle of whiskey to a pig's head (that's right, the head of a pig), and the whistles and hissing were deafening. In this case, Figo's signing represented a clear and painful affront to Barcelona's proud, opinionated fans; his betrayal was unforgivable. But Figo's signing also represented the first step in Perez's plan to build a team full of stars, or "galacticos". In the coming years, Perez would sign the best players in the world, including Ronaldo, Beckham, and Zinedine Zidane. Of course, building a successful soccer team is not that simple and the team underacheived. Last year, Figo was sold to Inter Milan, the first galactico to leave the Santiago Bernabeu nest. This year, Zidane announced his retirement, the second galactico to move on. They were done, right? Not exactly. To everyone's surprise, in a World Cup semifinal, Figo and Zidane crossed paths yesterday in Munich one final time.

Before the game, the stars could be seen talking in the tunnel before the game. They met again on the pitch, when they met with the referees as captains of their respective teams. As the game got underway, both teams attacked furiously. Portugal's Maniche sent a shot blazing over the bar and France constantly looked to Zidane to lead their attacks at the other end. It was clear that a goal was coming and, sure enough, when Ricardo Carvalho took down Thierry Henry, France had a penalty. Up stepped Zidane and, of course, he converted it. Score one for Zidane, one for France. And it would be all they needed. Portugal dominated possession for the rest of the game and France, clearly confident in their fantastic defense, sat back and let them attack. Cristiano Ronaldo was the most dangerous player for the Portuguese and it was his shot that was too hot for Barthez to handle, letting the ball ricochet off of him and into a sea of Portuguese players. It was Figo (who else?) who headed it goalwards, but he unbelievably sent it flying over the bar. One miss for Figo, one big miss for Portugal. And that was as close as they came, as they spent most of the match diving, begging for cards, berating their referee, and letting their coach Scolari go ballistic on the sidelines, pleading for fouls that never existed. It was a pretty despicable display, especially for a team that spent the days leading up to the match defending themselves from accusations of unfair play. In fact, Scolari walked out on a press conference before the game because he was so fed up with all of the bad press his team was receiving; Big Phil refused to answer questions in English, as is expected at the Cup, and he walked out of the press room while the worldwide media serenaded him to a chorus of whistles and boos (fortunately, no pig's heads were thrown). So you would think that Portugal would then have tried to get away from some of these bad habits in the semifinal, but then again how can France complain about Portugal when it was their own Henry who clearly took a dive to win a game-winning free kick against Spain? Either way, it's indicative of a bigger problem, one that FIFA has to address. And it also was evidence of Portugal's awareness of their Achilles heel: the lack of any good, powerful strikers. They are a team full of wingers, from Figo to Ronaldo to Simao, and midfielders, with Deco, Maniche, Petit, Costinha and Viana, but no real strikers. Pauleta is a terrible player with a ridiculous name (is that not a dimunitive for Paula?). Helder Postiga is even worse but has a better name. And Nuno Gomes even looks like a girl. Scolari must have been tempted to be the first ever coach to play a 4-6-0, which couldn't have been any less successful than his 4-5-1 that left his team short of goal-scoring options. Zidane's goal held up and it would be les Bleus who moved on to Sunday's final.

After the game, the two galacticos met one final time. Zidane and Figo exchanged shirts and captain's armbands at midfield. It was a meeting that proved to be one final reminder of their different fortunes at international level. Zidane has won the '98 World Cup, 2000 European Championships, and will now play for a second Cup title this Sunday. Figo, on the other hand, has never won an international title; Portugal failed to make the '98 Cup, lost in the semis - to France - of Euro 2000, crashed out in the first round of the '02 Cup, lost a heartbreaking final as host nation of Euro '04 to Greece, and has now been undone again by this French squad. Even in the court of public opinion, Zidane has fared better. He is the classy, graceful playmaker beloved the world over, while Figo has never won over the fans, especially the ones in Barcelona; in fact, it was his headbutt against a present-day Barcelona player, Mark Van Bommel, in Portugal's 2nd round game against Holland, that was one more indictment of Figo's character. There is no doubt that both are galacticos, but both have travelled down very different roads in their glorious careers. One full of love and success and unwavering admiration, the other marked by betrayal and failure and controversy. Oh, and a pig's head for good measure.