The date was 17 August 1994. The players trudged in at half-time with the score at 2-0. France coach Aime Jacquet had been punished for fielding a stoutly defensive side against Czech Republic. Laurent Blanc, Lilian Thuram, Marcel Desailly and Bruno N’Gotty all played as Jacquet packed his team full of centre-backs, hoping to stifle the Czechs. What little flair was provided by Eric Cantona, David Ginola and Christophe Dugarry had’t ignited. It was time for change. Enter a 22-year-old novice from Bordeaux. Zinedine Yazid Zidane.
The midfielder had built a reputation in Ligue 1 as a talented if slightly one-paced midfielder with Cannes and Bordeaux. Now it was time to see if his abilities could make the step up to international level. Corentin Martins off, Zidane on. Zizou took over as the primary playmaker with Ginola leaving the pitch for Bixente Lizarazu.
Czech Republic, who’d brought Patrik Berger and Karel Poborsky off the bench, continued to frustrate the French. Zidane, wearing an unfamiliar no.14 shirt, struggled to get into the game. But then, in the 85th minute, it happened. Zizou picked up a perfectly weighted pass from Blanc, beating one man without even touching the ball. A second defender came rushing out only to be sent back to Prague with a drop of Zizou’s right shoulder and a swivel of the hips. Zidane then shifted the ball from his right foot to his left foot, beating another man in the process, before arrowing the ball into the bottom corner from 30-yards out.
No celebration. No overjoyed passion at scoring his first international goal. Just the demand that someone fetch the dispatched ball out of the net and race it back to the centre circle. Two minutes later he was at it again, though this time showing a much underrated side of his game. An inswinging corner was whipped in. Czech Republic made the mistake of leaving Zidane unmarked on the edge of the area. He ambled into view before bulleting a header into the top corner from a good 10-yards out. This time he did allow himself a moment of celebration. Rightly so.
INFO:
Zinedine Yazid Zidane (born 23 June 1972), nicknamed "Zizou", is a French professional football coach and former player. Widely regarded as one of the greatest players of all time, Zidane was an elite playmaker, renowned for his elegance, vision, ball control and technique, and played as an attacking midfielder for Cannes, Bordeaux, Juventus and Real Madrid. At club level, Zidane won two league titles with Juventus, before a move to Real Madrid for a world record fee of €77.5 million in 2001, which remained unmatched for the next eight years. In Spain, Zidane won the league title and the Champions League, with his left-foot volleyed winner in the 2002 Champions League Final considered to be one of the greatest goals in the competition's history. Zidane also won an Intercontinental Cup and a Super Cup with both teams.
