Black, brown and beige find a crock of gold

Aime Jacquet, a man of the Loire, as profoundly French — in the old-fashioned sense — as you can get, prepared for the task by assembling a group that mirrors the ethnic composition of the contemporary France. His players trace their origins, or those of parents and grandparents, to Algeria, Argentina, Armenia, the Basque country, Ghana, Guadeloupe, Kazakhstan and New Caledonia, as well as the Var, the Ariege, Normandy, and the housing projects of Paris and Marseille.

The existence of a team like this is moving, humbling, and finally saddening because the dream it representsis an illusion. Humanity cannot remake itself in the image of a successful football team, healing its divisions and unifying its goals. The impermanence makes it more poignant.

But the football played by Jacquet’s team has not been an illusion, at least to Mario Zagallo, who stood on the touchline in gathering anguish as his players failed to find the answer to France’s impregnable defence. And the French team’s existence has been a pleasant surprise to the fellow countrymen, who have delighted in its merits, inventing new chants on the streets and in the metro carriages: "Thu-ram pre-si-dent!" and "Li-be-rez Lau-rent Blanc!"

As if the build-up was not already full of excitement and uncertainty, the tension was heightened by the circulation, 45 minutes before the kick-off, of an official team sheet from which the name of Ronaldo was omitted, replaced by Edmundo. Those with large amounts of money wagered on Brazil began calling their bookmakers, looking for a way out. Others speculated that the player’sdicky knee had caught up. The final option, a humanitarian gesture by Zagallo to even up France’s loss of the suspended Blanc, seemed unlikely. Would Brazil be required to match their achievement of 1962 in Chile, when they retained the trophy after losing the similarly talismanic Pele to injury early in the tournament? A quarter of an hour later a revised sheet had Ronaldo reinstated and Edmundo back on the bench.

Curiously, and in retrospect ominously, Zagallo’s team had failed to appear from the pre-match warm-up, leaving the French players to exercise alone. Since the Brazilians of 1994 and 1998 have been noted for their rigorous and protracted warm-ups, this absence heightened the mystery. The anonymity of Ronaldo’s performance will take some explaining.

Now they will be flayed alive for their failure. Zagallo’s part in all four of their previous victories will be set aside, his compatriots remembering only the failures of 1974 and 1998. A sad end, indeed, to an illustrious career.

The French crowddidn’t altogether observe the players’ request to abandon suits and ties in favour of jeans and trainers, but Platini and Johnny Halliday wore team shirts (the latter with Tricolours painted on his sculpted rock ‘n’ roll cheekbones), while Jacques Chirac carried his shirt over his arm but wore an Allez les Bleus scarf.

Poor Blanc, the victim of the greatest miscarriage of World Cup justice since Harald Schumacher committed grievous bodily harm on Patrick Battiston in 1982, loitered sadly in the tunnel before the kick-off, watching his team-mates prepare for the night that should have been his to share, although he was on hand before the kick-off to fulfil his ritual of giving Fabien Barthez a kiss on the top of the goalkeeper’s shaven head. But his part in the victory will not be forgotten.

Last night France began as if determined to set the tone and the tempo of the game, launching a series of raids on all fronts, with Guivarc’h receiving two chances inside the first three minutes, and Zidane andDjorkaeff linking effectively for the first time in the tournament. Karembeu and Thuram on the right, Petit and Lizarazu on the the left, and Deschamps in the middle looked alert and composed. Brazil sat back and waited for the game to take shape, but they were to pay for their refusal to inject pace into their movements.

To many of us, France offered our first experience of foreignness its language, its smells, its tastes, a sensibility both like and unlike our own. Their triumph is our pleasure, too.

(Observer News Service)