Frank W. Donovan’s Place

Vive la France

3-0

But don't forget

I happen to have been a Notre Dame football freak since infancy. My father knew the Four Horseman, and as captain of ND's first tennis team, he dealt with the atheletic director, Knute Rockne, on a regular basis. The best way to get money out of Rockne was to beat him at tennis. To learn that there was something even bigger than ND winning a national championship was quite a shock to me when I first crossed the Atlantic as a teenager.

Since my family consists of a French wife and sundry children, some of whom consider themselves first and foremost Italian, we did OK in this World Cup. Don't forget that Italy was the only team France failed to defeat. France simply won the craps shootout.

Nonetheless, three critical matches were decided by the shootout: France v. Italy, Brazil v. Netherlands and Argentina v. England. In my opinion and without taking anything away from an historic French team, this World Cup is one of the more disgraceful in recent memory and for all the wrong reasons. Corruption has not been foreign to WCs of the past, but none of that has been suggested this time around. Instead, something must be done to reverse the total dominance of the defense and to find some alternative to the trauma of the shootout, which can ruin the careers of wonderful players.Shame in soccer did lead in at least one case in Columbia  to a player's murder.

I hope I am wrong, but the proceedings in France conjured up a vision of a sun beginning to set on the world's most popular sport.