After hearing both sides of the story, FIFA have banned and fined both Zinedine Zidane and Marco Materazzi. Zidane gets a three match ban from international football, Materazzi a two match ban. Are FIFA the only ones who didn’t hear about Zidane’s retirement? Fair play to Zizou though, he’s offered to do three days of [...]

Some clever people at FAS.research took a break from business network analysis to put together this graphical representation of the World Cup final. The image “shows the passes from every player to those three team-mates he passes to most frequently.” The size of a players “node” indicates how often he was involved, the strength of [...]

Zidane says Materazzi insulted his mother and sister.

In an exciting final to the 2006 World Cup, Italy picks up its fourth title after defeating France in a penalty shoot out. It has been a long and wonderful trip. You can read the play-by-play below and leave your thoughts on the final and the World Cup. Final: France 1-1 a.et. Italy Italy 5-3 [...]

France or Italy. One of these teams tonight will earn the right to lift the greatest prize in sports, the World Cup. Here are some facts about the trophy that will be the center of the world’s attention in just a few more hours. * The Jules Rimet Cup now in the permanent possession [...]

Football is of course a team game, but there are many smaller battles that are played within the larger one. When France and Italy square off today, we will see some of the sport’s top players at positions across the pitch. We will also see some individual contests that could determine who lifts [...]

If there’s something that feels unexpected about a France-Italy final, perhaps it’s that the x-factors have been so unpredictable. By x-factor, I mean that something extra that distinguishes a World Cup champion or finalist from the wide-open field. And the field is always wide-open. Even if the odds makers or the media might call for a [...]

Before the semifinal between Germany and Italy, we shared with you’re the Pope’s strategy for supporting each team for a half. That didn’t really work out too well for Germany, but we like to think that it did contribute to an entertaining match. We can only speculate that the Pope will be fully [...]

I have a feeling if you took a poll in France a month ago there wouldn’t have been too many people that thought Les Bleus would lift the World Cup trophy in Berlin on July 9. My, how times have changed. A survey in France shows that 86% of the country thinks their [...]

It began over two years ago with 194 teams competing trying to qualify for 32 spots in the final. After 910 games and more than 2,600 goals, a champion will be crowned here in Berlin this evening. The past month has been a non stop weekend, holiday and party rolled into one for [...]