Good End to the Mega Event

As predicted Italy won the FIFA 2006 finals but not as convincingly as I thought it would. First half is clearly dominated by Italians. Surprisingly France played superbly in the second half with perfect co-ordination and clean passing, but couldn't break the Italian defense. I should call their defense a two layered one, the second is none other than the goal keeper, Baffon. He is rock-solid and never shown his nerves throughout the tournament. He saved a brilliant header from Zidane and the CUP. From that moment, anger and nervousness was evident on Zidane's face. He chose to play bull fight in the dying moments rather foot ball.

France shown their brilliance but failed to make it count. In my opinion coach's move to replace Henry, red card to Zidane caused their doom during the penalty shoot out. Over all its a great game, as one expects to see in a final. I also rate the semis between Italy and Germany at par with the final. These two are the best matches of this tournament.

Henry's game, kind of provoked hatred towards the French team (but liked Malouda and Zidane's game) . I somehow felt that, Henry is always on a look out for an easy goal, he seems to be a good actor, he knows how to get a penalty :-). Probably he might be the player against whom most number of off-sides are shown (at least in the last 3 games around 15 were shown).