The World Cup Final

The World Cup Final: the biggest collective event of all time. It is likely, if you watched it, that you have perhaps taken part in the most collectively watched moment in the history of the human species. The size of the World Cup final is bigger than any personality, any celebrity, any other accomplishment. In terms of numbers, this is bigger than landing on the moon….

…and it clearly got to Holland early. Obviously, Holland planned to “get stuck in” to disrupt the Spanish passing game. But “get stuck in” + “oh by the way, half of all the humans who have ever lived are probably watching you” is an absolutely terrible combination. That’s how you get the van Persie foul, the van Bommel clear out, and Nigel De Jong, the next, next, Karate Kid. Hey Nigel, the job’s been filled… Will Smith’s kid has that one locked down, I’d maybe go back to giving that football player idea a try.

The most intriguing moment of the first half, however, involved what could have been a glorious moment in World Cup history. There was a stoppage of play for an injury and the Dutch tried to return the ball to Spain following the stoppage by sending the ball back to Iker Casillas…. except that the ball took a comically high bounce off these infamous South African pitches, and Casillas just barely pawed it out for a corner. Robin van Persie finished the job by playing the corner straight to Casillas with no Dutch players around to pressure (on the ground this time.)

It was a nice moment of sportsmanship… but had that ball gone in, we could have seen a glorious moment of sportsmanship. I believe, I truly believe, had that ball gone in, that Holland would have abandoned their goal and allowed Spain to equalize…. and what a truly great moment that would have been. As foxy and sneaky as football players are, they still are sporting and respectful athletes…. and as much as you may hate diving and embellishing, what other sport has moments where one team would concede a lead in the championship in the name of sporting play? Oh, how I wish it had happened.

Robben had two great chances to win for his country in the second half. The second one answered the age-old question, why would honest players embellish fouls? Because, gentle reader, you need to give your official no choice but to make a non-decision a decision. If you play through a pull down that should be a red card and possibly a penalty, and if you have a referee notorious for being gutless with red card and penalty decisions in the big match, then the referee is going to take the coward’s way out. He is not going to reward your industry, and your sense of fair play. He is going to think about himself and his reputation first. No one remembers a non-call if the player stays on his feet. But if you go tumbling down, roll like an idiot, and scream at the officials for a foul, then even the non-decision becomes a decision. Believe me, if you played match after match, week after week, and this was your experience with refs, you would do the same thing.

Let’s be fair. Howard Webb was equally gutless for both sides. De Jong should have been sent off in the first half. Robben should have been given a penalty. Xavi’s fall in extra time did not deserve a penalty, but we were all simply lucky that the facts of the play corresponded with Webb’s indecisiveness. I firmly believe that Howard Webb doesn’t have the courage to make a major game changing decision, so he tries to mask this indecisiveness by flashing a yellow card at anything that moves during the match to make him appear to be a tough ref by overdoing simpler decisions and also trying to paralyze both sides into not creating any controversial decisions he’s afraid to make, because he doesn’t want to award pens or give straight reds.

Luckily for us, Webb has no problem distributing yellows. He sent off Heitinga for the pull he didn’t even blow the whistle for at the other end on Arjen Robben. He carded Xavi for kicking a ball away, but didn’t when Arjen Robben did it. He missed an obvious foul at the edge of the box that spurred the break in the other direction which led to the goal. He gave Heitinga two yellows even though the first yellow was given for a play where Iniesta stepped on Heitinga’s foot and went down like a ton of bricks.

The best team won. Holland should have been playing with ten men for 80 minutes, not 10. But this should be the end of Howard Webb’s career in big matches. He cannot do them.

But we need to speak of our new WORLD CHAMPIONS. Spain followed up the 2008 European Champions followed it up with a World Championship despite getting absolutely nothing out of Fernando Torres, their supposed star above all stars. They did not need him. People pushed them, people kicked them, people tried to stop them by stopping football itself. It was not always pretty, but the world’s best football team prevailed regardless. It was a scorched earth victory for football, but football won anyway, and while we might not have been entertained, the fact that Spain are the winners is, ultimately, a light in the darkness.

Let’s all agree to remember the following. The octopus was psychic. Iniesta took a fabulous tournament winning goal, and left with a wonderful tribute to Dani Jarque. It was on the whole a wonderful tournament, and a wonderful celebration of life. It need not be more complicated than that. Cheers South Africa, congratulations to Spain.

We at Glorious Football would like to thank you for your faithful readership of our extensive World Cup coverage. It’s been a true pleasure to present to you the astute insights and re-caps of our Cup-savvy writers, in particular Steven Maloney. But now that the big tournament’s done, we’ll still be around bringing you the best of the best sport on the planet! Stay tuned… -Ed.

Written By Steven Maloney (63 Posts)

Steven Maloney is a regular contributor for Glorious Football. You can follow him on Twitter @stevenmaloney. Like Albert Camus, he fancies himself as having learned his morals "on the football pitch and in the theater." His football writing interests are in the institutional structures and strategies of world football, as well as the ways in which contemporary politics enters into the world of football and vice-versa. His most cherished memories of the game are of being in Holland for Euro 2000. In the interests of full disclosure, he supports Arsenal, the United States and DC United.