Zidane returns to adulation, intrigue and calls to tell all
· Chirac greets flawed hero with unconditional praise
· Lip-readers say terrorist insult led to violent attack
Angelique Chrisafis in Paris, John Hooper in Rome
Tuesday July 11, 2006
The Guardian
Under a haze of French flags and firecracker smoke, the crowd of several thousand people filling Place de la Concorde yesterday afternoon chanted "Zizou! Zizou!" in a hero's welcome for Zinédine Zidane, the French football captain sent off for headbutting an Italian player as France lost the World Cup final.
At the same time, Italian politicians, French anti-racism campaigners and a host of international lip-readers were trying to unravel the mystery of what Italy's Marco Materazzi might have said to provoke Zidane into violence, with some suggesting
he might have called the son of Algerian immigrants "a dirty terrorist" and said his sister was a "whore".
Looking unmistakably sheepish, the man once nicknamed "Zidane President" waved down to the adoring Paris crowd who were keen to forgive their national hero for going out of his last ever match on a red card. Zidane, the immigrant warehouseman's son who practised his first shots against the grim concrete high rises of north Marseille, carried on his shoulders the weight of France's football success - not to mention championing racial integration, healing the country's bruised national image, and boosting the economy by making people feel good - all the time advertising a host of national products from mineral water to yoghurt.
President Jacques Chirac, well aware that he too is in his final hours at the helm, and beset by problems, praised the captain unconditionally.
"The match you played last night was full of talent and professionalism," he said. "I know that you are sad and disappointed, but what I want to tell you is that the whole country is extremely proud of you. You have honoured the country with your exceptional qualities and your fantastic fighting spirit, which was your strength in difficult times, but also in winning times."
But analysts in Paris said if Zidane wanted to save his future advertising contracts, he would have to explain himself.
A former Juventus player, Zidane would have understood any comment made in Italian.
Speculation was rife on the streets of Paris yesterday that it was either a racist or anti-Algerian comment, or a taunt at his mother, who is believed to be unwell, or his French-Spanish wife. One Italian lip-reader told the BBC that Materazzi said first: "I wish an ugly death to you and all your family," and then simply "go **** yourself". Zidane is fiercely proud of his family and roots in the Algerian village of Taguemount in Kabylie and calls himself a non-practising Muslim.
The French campaign group SOS Racism said yesterday that according to several well informed sources,
Materazzi called Zidane a "dirty terrorist". It called on Fifa to investigate and discipline the Italian player if it were true.
In Italy, a government MP said he was tabling a question in parliament after a report in the Guardian suggested that Materazzi had called Zidane a terrorist.
The 32-year-old Italian defender
Materazzi is viewed as the hardest of the "hard men" in Serie A. In 2004, he was given one of longest bans in the history of the Italian game for an unprovoked attack on another player in the tunnel. His victim, who was punched in the face, said Materazzi had taunted him throughout the game.
Riccardo Villari, a centre-left deputy, said he had asked Italy's sports minister to find out what had happened. "Without wishing to detract in any way from the joy of yesterday's victory, if what has been reported by the Guardian is true, it would represent a reprehensible episode."
On his return to Italy, Materazzi said: "It is absolutely not true that I called him a terrorist. I don't even know what it means. What happened was seen by everyone on live television."
A Brazilian television channel, Globo,
quoted lip-readers as saying the Italian defender had twice called Zidane's sister a "whore" before launching an unspecified insult at the player himself.
Zidane's agent, Alain Migliaccio, said that the French captain had been
"provoked" when Materazzi had said "something very grave". He told Radio Five live:
"He [Zidane] will not reveal what Materazzi said, but he will in one or two days' time explain why he had such a reaction. When he is calmer he will speak. When I saw him at 2am he was very sad, he did not want to end his career like this."
Among the Algerian community on the streets near Paris's Gare du Nord yesterday, the feeling was that Zidane was "unfairly abused". "Materazzi must have said something about his family," said 18-year-old Aziz, who started playing for the local football team aged 10 when Zidane led France to world cup victory in 1998. "It's a shame that Zidane has sullied his career, but he will always have a place in our hearts," he said. Some sections of the French press were less forgiving. The biggest selling sports daily, L'Equipe, asked in a frontpage piece: "What should we tell our children, for whom you have become an example for ever?... How could that happen to a man like you?"
Pascal Boniface, director of Paris's Institute for International and Strategic Relations and author of a recent book on football and globalisation, said Zidane's huge advertising contracts were probably safe. "Zidane must now come forward and explain. It won't kill off his contracts - it wasn't a line of coke.
But it's good for us to see our national hero is fallible."
ALLEZ ZIZOU! WE LOVE YOU STILL!!!!
Zidane Returns to Adulation, Intrigue and Calls to Tell All
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