Team of the tournament

The Editor — Sun, July 9th 2006

The best 11 players of World Cup 2006

Five Italians, three French make up my team of the tournament. As could be expected from a team conceding just 1 goal (an own goal, at that) on the way to the final, the Italians make up the majority of the defence.

Zidane makes the team on the basis of his performances at the ‘business end’ of the tournament against France and Brazil especially.

Lehmann makes the goalkeeping spot his own, looking solid throughout and performing heroics in the penalty shoot out.

Kaka is the only non-European who makes the team. The only member of the miss-firing Brazillian attack to achieve any consistency until marked out of the game by the French.

The biggest surprise is Ribery. While erratic at times he so often provided France with the energy that the aging squad lacked, supporting Zidane and Henry in attack, while fitting back into the French’s defensive formation when they didn’t have the ball.

Goalkeeper

1. Lehmann (Germany)

Defenders

2. Materazzi (Italy)
3. Cannavarro (Italy)
4. Thuram (France)
5. Grosso (Italy)

Midfielders

6. Gattuso (Italy)
7. Pirlo (Italy)
8. Kaka (Brazil)
11. Ribery (France)

Attackers

9. Klose (Germany)
10. Zidane (France)

Listed in: Competitions, World Cup

Comments

you chose lehmann over buffon!!! why?

.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) at 10:17 PM on Monday, July 10, 2006

It was between Lehmann and Buffon and I didn’t want to pick too many Italians!

Anyway, Lehmann did not have as a good defence in front of him as Buffon.

.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) at 12:31 PM on Tuesday, July 11, 2006

Ok… Good reasoning, that is the part about the extra defensive support… not about having too many Italians!
ciao

.(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address) at 4:52 PM on Tuesday, July 11, 2006

The Fan