Note to Raymond Domenech: Oh, Shut up Already!

www.soccerway.com/news/2007/January/29/materazzi-goes-down-easily-says-domenech/

Boy, Raymond Domenech is really having a hard time dealing with the World Cup loss, eh? It seems he can't refrain from negatively commenting on anything about Italy. Ray, let....it....go. Imagine if Dino Zoff would have complained months after Italy's 2-1 loss to France at Euro 200 despite outclassing les bleus? How about if Cesare Maldini lamented continuously after falling to eventual champions France in a shoot-out and in a match France played poorly?

That's right: people would call them sore losers. The fact is that they took those difficult losses and moved on. No derogatory comments were made towards France in public.

Too bad France has reacted like they have. Sometimes in sports the best team does not win. Or sometimes the best team does not play up to par and manages to eke a victory. Italy was the best team in the tournament overall. France was not. The French themselves caught some major breaks in 2006.

Both are great soccer countries. Move on. No one said life was fair.

Of course, reading the threads about the incident (which most people did not see) it's also a chance for many to spew their anti-soccer and prejudiced views.

Here's the thing about this particular head butt that elicited a comment from Ray. Sampdoria player Del Vecchio is an aggressive type of player.With the play in question, Del Vecchio slid and tried to poke the ball past Inter Milan goalie Julio Caesar. If one paid close attention, he tried to clip Caesar. The best way to describe it is when a hockey player taps, pokes or jabs at the goalie's glove after he freezes the puck. We all know how defenders feel about that.

Materazzi simply confronted Del Vecchio by getting in his face. He, gulp, was right to do so. He served notice to Sampdoria that the Inter defense was not going to tolerate this sort of act. Furthermore, he stuck up for his team mate. Del Vecchio reacted by, interestingly. head butting him. Could Materazzi stayed on his feet? Perhaps. It is interesting to note that he did get a cut lip suggesting Del Vecchio managed to connect.

Again, I'm on record as saying that I'm not the biggest Materazzi fan. However, we should not rush to judge and compare this to the Zidane incident. No matter how many times we will revisit this, Zidane has no one but himself to blame for his stupidity. Domenech can hide behind a thin veil of fabricated justifications all he wants but it won't deviate from this hard truth. Gosh, what if the tables were turned?

Domenech, who suffers from selective memory syndrome, is hoping to deflect the absurd actions of Zidane onto Materazzi any chance he gets. Say what you want, Materazzi did not violently attack anyone. His goal is to get under the skin of a player. The reactions of Del Vecchio and Zidane were the work of players who could not keep their cool. Both received red cards. End of story. Point final.

It just so happens that Materazzi is always in the middle of a controversy. We can debate whether he is the type of player teams want but spare me the anti-Italy rhetoric that has followed it. Soccer is filled with far worse offenders than The Matrix as he is known. Former Italy player Marco Tardelli is on record saying that Materazzi - although right - could have approached it differently. Maybe. But that's not the point.

What makes Domenech's comments remarkable - if not hypocritical - is the fact that there are a few players "who go down easy" on his own team. Try Malouda and Henry for starters. Domenech is best to restrict his comments to his team and to look in the mirror first.

Raymond, stuff a pastry in your mouth have an allonge and just shut up.