The foul play 2002 World Cup Awards

BEST PLAYER

Some people would see it as faintly bizarre to select a goalkeeper as the player of the tournament, but Oliver Kahn’s case is unanswerable: he was simply much better at his job than anybody else at these finals. More impressive than the rest of the German team put together (not hard, admittedly), Kahn was the greatest player in the tournament by several miles. Intimidating, impassable and indefatigable.

WORST PLAYER

Here, I’m tempted to single out one of the Saudi centre-backs, or Ian Harte for that matter. But purely in terms of not doing justice to your own abilities, it has to be Patrick Vieira, who looked disinterested throughout all three of France’s games and allowed himself to be pushed around by opposite numbers as unheralded as Aliou Cissé, Pablo García and Thomas Gravesen. Vieira wins this award ahead of Figo, Batistuta, Beckham and Totti for the simple reason that those players managed one good game each in the tournament, whereas he did not.

BEST GOAL

You can take your pick from half the Brazilian efforts. I’d personally go for Edmilson’s wonderful bicycle-kick against Costa Rica, which just shades Ronaldinho’s 50-yard run and pass to set up Rivaldo against England. Elsewhere, there was Roberto Carlos’ screamer against China (his first for Brazil since the famous one against France in Lyon in 1997), Junior’s solo effort in the Costa Rica game, Rivaldo’s volley against Belgium, Ronaldinho chipping Seaman . . .

WORST GOAL

Carsten Jancker practically tripping over himself as he bundled the ball into the Saudi Arabian net, with two other Germans waiting to pounce if he somehow managed to miss it. Perhaps that should be re-titled “Cheapest Goal”.

BEST GAME

Brazil v Costa Rica. It was a 7.30am kick-off, so a lot of people will have missed it, but it was still the best World Cup game I’ve seen since Romania v Argentina in USA 94. Runner-up: Ireland v Spain.

WORST GAME

South Africa v Slovenia, which I watched at a friend’s house in an early-morning stupor from the night before. Bad call. Ninety long, looooooonnnnnngggg minutes of misplaced passes, botched set-pieces, woefully miscued shots and, near the end, some downright evil tackling as it dawned on the Slovenians that they were going home. Even the only goal, by South Africa’s Nomvethe, was a farce: a would-be header that flew in off his knee. Pure shite from pillar to post.

BEST REFEREEING DECISION

The bravery of Ecuadorian ref Byron Moreno in giving Francesco Totti a second yellow card for flinging himself to the ground against South Korea (see below).

WORST REFEREEING DECISION

Spain having a goal ruled out against Korea by an idiot linesman, when the ball hadn’t even come close to going out of play.

BIGGEST IRRITANT

The graceless whingeing of the Italian team and fans, who laid all the blame for their early elimination at the door of a referee who had a very good game. Did the ref force Christian Panucci to cock up a straightforward clearance and hand South Korea a deserved equaliser? Did he influence Christian Vieri to shoot over the bar of an open goal from three yards out? Was he responsible for Paolo Maldini being rooted to the spot for the Korean winner? No, no and thrice no.

NICEST SURPRISE

Gary Breen.

STUPIDEST GOAL CELEBRATION

You are a hitherto unheralded Senegalese midfielder named Pape Bouba Diop. You have just put your country into the lead against France in the opening match of the 2002 World Cup, before a 63,000 crowd in Seoul and an estimated television audience of two billion people. So how do you react? Do you (a) go berserk with joy and pump your fist in the air; (b) trot calmly back to the centre circle, GAA-style, shrugging off the congratulations of your team-mates; or (c) amble over to the corner flag, remove your shirt and do a slow-motion limbo dance around it? The latter, of course. Whatever happened to spontaneity?

WORST FOUL

Poland’s Tomasz Hajto disgracefully stamping on the ankle of Portugal’s Joao Pinto, in an incident missed by Hugh Dallas, presumably because Hajto wasn’t wearing a green and white hooped jersey at the time.

Incidentally, it didn’t go unnoticed round our way that Mr Dallas managed to hand out a ridiculous yellow card to the USA’s Eddie Pope against Germany. Loyalist conspiracy!!!

WORST REFEREE

Not Dallas, but Antonio López Nieto, who managed to book virtually everybody on the pitch during Germany-Cameroon, throwing in a couple of red cards (one debatable, the other scandalous) for good measure. His notebook must have looked like the Dead Sea Scrolls index by the end.

DOZIEST PIECE OF DEFENDING

The slip-up between two South Koreans that let in Hakan Sükür to score in the third place play-off, in less time than it takes to say, “Surely the Turks haven’t picked that two-left-feet streak of piss up front again?”

BEST COMMENTATING GAFFE

“He’s coming inside Bradley Carnell here, but Carnell doesn’t like it and lets him know that he’s not going to go all the way.” — Graham Taylor, ITV, Spain v South Africa.

Runner-up: “The World Cup, live and exclusive on RTE.” – Stephen Alkin.

BIGGEST LET-DOWN

The French, who dethroned Holland’s Italia 90 side as the most disappointing team in any World Cup tournament. “If you take away Zidane, Henry, Vieira, Trezeguet, Thuram, Petit, Lizarazu, Barthez and Wiltord… France aren’t that great,” said the yellow sponge to the red sponge in the MasterCard advert. Insert your own punchline here.