The 2006 World Cup: The Dissapointment

I'm not a soccer fan, but I have been following the World Cup... well kind of. I mean I know the songs that are supposed to be the "Themes of the World Cup" like Dance by Lumidee and Love Generation by Bob Sinclair. I also have my favorite soccer players who just so happen to be visually appealing on and off the soccer pitch. I've also watched (some of) some games if they happened to be on at Waxy's or at home, or I was waiting for friends who were 20 minutes late at Zanoni's. I felt like shedding a tear when I saw that Germany had beaten Portugal, even though I only found out the match's outcome several hours later and was on a plane to Dubai. So I guess I have been doing a decent job of following the Cup. However the only match which I saw in it's entirety was France vs. Brazil in the quarter finals. We all remember World Cup '98. France, unbelievably, beat Brazil for the World Cup title. I thought, "OK, I have to see this game. See Brazil take back their glory that France has been holding onto since 1998. Anyway France hasn't been playing well in this World Cup anyway." Oh well, I and the majority of the people watching the match (at least in South Africa) were to be sorely dissapointed by the match's outcome. Brazil lost to France, 0:1. It seemed like all of a sudden France's squad, who had been drawing almost all their matches had woken up and were really bringing it for Brazil. And to quote one of my cousins who I watched the match with: "When Brazil falls apart, they fall apart in big way." Needless to say, the match's outcome was depressing. The attitude of many South Africans, as I have heard from people I know and on the radio, is that they don't even want to watch the final of the World Cup, which is a BIG deal in a country where there Number One watched sport is Soccer.