If you had been following the World Cup of soccer for the past few weeks, you probably are already aware of the infamous Zidane headbutting incident from Sunday’s final. If not, here is the incident that led to France’s Zinedine Zidane receiving a red card – an incident that ultimately, might have cost France the game (no tears shed about that from my side, I can assure you!)
The million dollar question is what did Italy’s Marco Materazzi say to Zidane, to provoke such a violent response? The media is rife with speculation, with lip readers being employed to try and ascertain what Materazzi said.
An Italian lip-reader, who claimed to have deciphered Materazzi’s words, told the BBC that Materazzi had said: “I wish an ugly death to you and all your family”, and then added, “Go f— yourself.”
Britain’s top forensic lip-reader, Jessica Rees – whose skill has led her to be summoned as an expert witness at criminal trials – believed Materazzi called Zidane a “son of a terrorist whore” before he added, “So just f— off”.
The Daily Mail said it, too, engaged a lip-reader who reached the same conclusion as Rees.
Brazil’s Globo television also employed lip-reading experts, who concluded Materazzi had twice told Zidane his sister was a “whore”, before directing “a coarse word” at him.
The French anti-racism group SOS Racisme issued a statement alleging that “several very well informed sources from the world of football” were convinced Materazzi called Zidane a “dirty terrorist”.
—-Zidane’s parents are Algerian, and he describes himself as a non-practising Muslim. Mokhtar Haddad, a cousin who gathered with friends and family to examine the incident on a big screen in the family’s village of Aguemoune, 260 kilometres east of Algiers, said: “We think he either called him a terrorist or a son of Harkis.” Harkis is a severe insult to Algerians, a term for collaborators in the Algerian war of independence from France. “The insult went in that direction,” said Djamel Zidane, the player’s brother. “Otherwise, he would not have reacted that way.”
“I did insult him, it’s true,” Materazzi said in Tuesday’s Gazzetta dello Sport. “But I categorically did not call him a terrorist. I’m not cultured and I don’t even know what an Islamic terrorist is.”
But given this speculation about whether or not Materazzi used a “terrorist” related insult, I had to laugh at this report from Fox Sports, which quotes Materazzi’s agent.
But last night Materazzi’s agent Phil Smith revealed the Italian’s version of what happened.He said it began when Materazzi grabbed the Frenchman’s shirt, pinching his nipple. “If you want my shirt so much, then you can f…… have it after the game,” Zidane supposedly said.
“I’d rather have the shirt off your woman,” Materazzi responded, a reference to Zidane’s wife Veronique. Ka-boom.
“He is a person who doesn’t say much but bottles it up and then one day explodes.”
