A Dutch camera team showed up today at Columbia to get an interview about the Superbowl this Sunday. I told them, “No wonder you guys want to get an interview about football. Your Worldcup game against Portugal was more football than soccer!” Do you remember the dirtiest game of last year’s FIFA World Cup? Oh God, I am getting nostalgic about those days, and guest blogger Levav. Shall we have him back?
I know, the SCHMITTblog is supposed to return to marketing and business topics this week. But I couldn't resist passing this on, from The International Herald Tribune (but pretentious and French enough to be from Le Monde), it's... "Camus and Zidane Offer Views on How Things End"
If you don't have a Times Select account here's a sample...
In "The Stranger," the existentialist novel by Albert Camus, an alienated French-Algerian man, Meursault, kills an Arab on the beach in the glare of the sunlight. It is a senseless act, as senseless as the way he fires one deadly shot, and then four more into the prone body. Zinédine Zidane, a Frenchman born to Algerian parents in Marseille, did not kill anyone in the glare of the floodlights of Berlin's Olympic Stadium... All that Zidane killed was a certain narrative of his life...
On my World Cup blog (blogs.iht.com/worldcupcohen)... Jessica Torres wrote from Dallas, Texas: 'Before he was a god. But then he showed us all that he was just a man. A man with weakness and hate... I am much more affected by him than I would have been had things gone as I hoped. But, my Lord, was that head butt sexy.'...
Camus was averse to judgment. Acts themselves, explicable or not, were all that we could know existed... Perhaps [Zidane] sought an almost unseen act of anger that would prompt a global, virtual argument about the merits or demerits of a gesture without sense.
Brilliant!
-David Rogers
I wanted to title this blog simply “Zidane,” praising the extraordinary career of one of the greatest soccer players as he retires. After today’s ugly move -- in the 110th minute of the final against Italy, which Italy ultimately won, Zidane headbutted Italian defender Materazzi and received a red card for it -- Mr. Zidane still deserves praise for his career. But he does not deserve the grand blog I had prepared for him. He simply lost it, at a critical phase of the game in one of the most significant games of his life. His behavior will always be sadly remembered – by his fans and likely by himself as well.
Yet, what did Mr. Materazzi say? I suggest that he simply tell us. Mr. Materazzi’s answer may provide us with unique insight into what made one of the greatest players tick. Depending on what he said, it may also raise questions about individual sportsmanship and the ethics of the soccer sport as a whole.
I hope Mr. Materazzi (rather than Mr. Zidane) will tell us. I hope Mr. Materazzi will have the greatness of character to tell us the truth, even if it may reflect badly on him.
Dear friends,
Even though I have no more reason to live, from the nether-reaches of my despair I find the energy to write. Why? One word: schadenfreude. So ironic, that a Kraut word would best describe my feelings about a Kraut loss. But it's true. Yesterday, while watching Italy crash the Kraut party 2-0, I started giggling. There is simply nothing more joyful in seeing all those big Krauts shedding tears of humiliation, all the while knowing the our other bitter enemies, Brazil and England, are also moping at home. After losing the lottery in the quarterfinals (penalty kicks, as Italian coach Marcelo Lippi said, are a lottery), there is some joy in watching others fall. Personally I also hate Italy--I hate their boring soccer--but my anti-Kraut sentiments trump my anti-Italian sentiments. Plus, Italian midfielder Mauro Camoranesi is actually Argentine, having received his Italian citizenship only in the past few years. So really, there is some victory here for Argentina after all.
Thank you, Mauro, for making sure that Schmitt in a wig wasn't the lasting image of this Cup.
Thank you, Fabio Grosso, for making Jens Lehman look like a flailing rag in goal.
Thank you, Alessandro del Piero, for driving a stake through the Kraut heart (or the cavity where hearts are supposed to be).
So here goes my prediction. France should beat the belly-flopping Porties this evening. But the French dream will end on Sunday, when Italy beats my tricolor geezers. The Italians simply have much better haircuts. Speaking of looks, Italy has the look of a world champion--playing well enough to win when it counts, but never good enough to be really convincing.
OK, back to moping now. Maybe I'll go see my Argentine psychoanalyst.
LEVAV
The defeat of the German team will mark the end of my soccer blogging. Now, as in the past (see categories on the right) I will blog again about business and management topics, about brands and experience, opera and culture, and teaching and academia. For a few days, while I will be traveling back from Asia to the U.S.,I will also let my guest bloggers take over. I know there are a couple more games, and either the French or Italians or Portuguese will win the cup -- but who cares? Germany will play one more time, too, for the number 3 slot against the loser of tonite's game (France v Portugal) but as a Nike ad once put it, "there is no winning silver, there's only losing gold."
The final score: North Korea fired 4 missiles; Italy scored 2 goals; and Germany got nil. And Levav can be happy: The lasting image of this worldcup will not be SCHMITT with his German flag hairdo in triumphant pose; but a sad SCHMITT being soaked by the rain after the game in the early morning hours in Seoul.
I am in Korea; it is 3am in the morning -- in one hour the semifinal against Italy will start. I will be heading to a bar run by a German, together with my friend Dae Ryun Chang, professor at Yonsei and a big soccer fan (he even authored an article on soccer in a book to be published soon). I am already wearing the German flag punk hairdo and the flag on my cheeks. Ready to go ...
My “experience” book just appeared in Italian, making it the 18th foreign language of my books (if I am counting correctly). Lia Zarantonello, a co-researcher of mine and visiting scholar at Columbia, was instrumental in getting the translation and adaptation to the Italian market done. Thanks, Lia. Now, she’s writing me an email, saying that the Italian team will beat the Germans “in Germany on July 4.” I wrote back – nicely (the Italian psyche is as fragile as the Argentine) -- “Germany vs. Italy: 2:1 in overtime.” Since an Italian upset is simply not going to happen, I am sure we will hear quite a bit of Levavian whining and crying coming from Italy.
Thus I am wondering what will happen to my book sales in Italy after the game. I am afraid there might be a massive consumer boycott: No proud Italian will buy an experience book written by a German then!
Looking further ahead, I am proud to say that none of my books on experience management has ever been translated into French; it seems the French simply don’t trust a German/American to know anything about that very-French topic. (Perhaps that explains, in part, why the books are successful in the U.S.) So no worries about book sales there, after the final.
BTW, it is 6am in Tokyo, and I am getting ready for my talk tonight on "corporate creativity." My creative opening will include references to the Worldcup, and I'll be wearing my German flag team wig above my Oswald Boateng Givenchy suit. In fact, that may not be a bad fashion statement for the final either, a sort of personalized SCHMITT statement in support of this tournament's FIFA anti-racism slogan "A Time to Make Friends(TM)."
As I am posting this, I am reading Levav’s latest and very sad post. My good friend, I will be in New York for the final; I will be your Argentinian (even your Argentine) psychotherapist; I will dance tango with you. There’s more to soccer than winning. Didn’t you see Cars (that pathetic kids movie)?
Note: I wrote the following on LH714 to Tokyo but the internet connection all of a sudden failed to function; so I am sending it only now from my hotel in Tokyo...
I am on the way from Germany to Japan, somewhere above Russia, and I have been following today’s games on Lufthansa’s Flynet and Boeing’s Connexion internet services. “What kind of soccer fan are you?” you might ask. I accept that scolding; I should have stayed in Germany. Maybe my Japanese client would have understood. Not watching the games, I am dependent on the soccer linguistics of the bloggers and commentators. And one phrase stands out: “lack of creativity.” Every self-declared soccer expert had the Brazilians, as one expert put it, “at least in the semi-final.” The Economist wrote that Brazil “reigns supreme,” and that German win was “unlikely.” And here are the Brazilians, showing no creativity, and being outclassed by the French. My own take before the start of the worldcup was perhaps too extreme: I had the Brazilian team out before the quarterfinals – a prediction that was, in retrospect, too extreme. (However, who would have thought they’d meet Ghana in the round of 16?)
In times of radical change, and the clearest evidence of this are these quarterfinals, experts are too conservative. Mavericks, like myself, are more likely to get it right. And what is that radical change? First, “soccer as usual” without creativity won’t do anymore. That’s why Brazil is out; that’s why England is out. (One of the commentators described Britain’s act against Portugal as “heroic,” -- a term often used for teams that shined in the past and now fail in their last, desperate effort. Never mind that the Brits rarely shined in the past.) Second, professional and innovative management is required to succeed (see my last blog). Finally, guts, passion and perseverance get you a long way (cf. Zidane) – but most of the young, high paid celebrity players don’t seem to have enough of it.
