World Cup Fever

Italy is already in the final. Who will join them today? The rejuvenated France? Or Portugal who havent lost a match since the Euro 2004 Final against Greece.

Defeating Brazil, France have a lot of confidence. Beating a defending champion, a favorite, and a team with all that talent, will do you a lot of good, confidence-wise. They already repeated the result of the 1998 World Cup final, will they qualify to this years final and repeat the Euro 2000 final?

Coach Domenech, who has been hammered for his tactics, before and during the first round of the World Cup, has delivered at the right time. He will have the help of Zinedine Zidane, one of the finest, if not the finest, players of his generation, who will hang his boots after the World Cup. Will it be on the 8th of July (if France looses) or on the 9th of July (if France qualifies to the final). Zidane has a yellow card in hand, he is joined by Willy Sagnol, Louis Saha, Lilian Thuram, Patrick Vieira and Franck Ribery. If any of them gets a yellow in this game, they will automatically get banned for the next match. A number of Portugese players also have yellow cards, this game will be interesting in this aspect.

Portugal have Deco and Costinha in the squad after they served their one game ban during the quarterfinal clash against England. Figo will once again play in the same feild as Zidane, for the last time. They were team-mates at Real Madrid. They know eachother well, so their midfield battle will be interesting since both of them play in a similar role in their team. Figo is also on a yellow card, along with Maniche, Ricardo, Ricardo Carvalho and Nuno Valente. Portugal also have the experience of Phil Scolari, who won the World Cup last time with Brazil. He has been the main reason of Portugal’s rise in international football. Will he guide his team to a second consecutive final, or maybe also a title?

We will have to wait and see. This match has the potential of being one of the most exciting matches we have seen so far, both teams play beautiful, attacking football.

Cant Wait!