Vive la France! In a high-scoring final, France ends Croatia’s Cinderella dreams
France wears the World Cup crown in 2018, twenty years after its first Cup win on home soil in 1998.
Happy Monday—Bonjour, not than anyone in France is practicing English today; they’re probably still celebrating from last night. This is episode number 67 of Plain English and you can find the transcript online at PlainEnglish.com/67. Remember no translations today, but the translations will be back on all future episodes.
France is the World Cup champion
France’s first goal was scored by Croatia and its second goal came courtesy of a video review, but they sealed the deal without any help, emphatically putting Croatia away with two late goals and delivering a World Cup victory ahead of schedule.
When the clock reached the 95th minute, the referee’s final whistle blew and the French players came streaming off the bench to celebrate at midfield with their coach Didier Deschamps, for whom the exhilaration of World Cup victory was actually a reprise. He was the captain on the 1998 championship team on his home turf.
France’s year was supposed to be 2022. A young team led by 19-year old Kylian Mbappé and 25-year old Paul Pogba was supposed to reach its peak at the next World Cup, but they crashed Belgium’s party last Tuesday and became the unexpected champions four years early.
France’s victory was Croatia’s heartbreak. Croatia in 2018 was what we call a Cinderella story. In sports, we say a Cinderella story is when a team has far exceeded its expectations in a tournament or a season. And little Croatia, ranked 20th by FIFA at the beginning of the tournament, went on an unexpected, exciting run all the way to the finals. They swept the group round, winning all three of their games. They then had to survive three consecutive extra-time games, including two they won in penalties. They became the second-smallest nation ever to reach the World Cup finals. But their Cinderella journey ran out of gas just before the finish line—and the tournament’s final night belonged to France.
And it was a freaky night. Apart from the thunder and lighting, play had to be stopped by a fan who stormed the field. Croatia got the scoring started—against themselves. France earned a free kick in the eighteenth minute, but Croatia striker Mario Mandzukic, attempting to defend the kick, headed the ball over his own goalkeeper’s head, unwittingly giving France the early lead. Ten minutes later midfielder Ivan Perisic scored a goal to even up the score.
Perisic then figured in the next goal—but again, not in a way that Croatia would like. He jumped up to defend a ball, and the ball struck his hand, which may have prevented the ball from getting near the Croatia net. That was initially not called a handball penalty, but the French players requested a video review. The Argentine referee consulted the replay on the sidelines and ultimately awarded a free kick penalty to France, which Antoine Griezmann easily knocked in for France’s second goal.
The call was controversial because it did not seem to be an intentional use of Perisic’s hands, and the referee did not initially call a free kick. But the referee used the video replay system on the sidelines, which has been received positively at this year’s tournament, and called the free kick for France. On Fox the commentators were divided, but tilted toward awarding the penalty. I read some commentary on England’s BBC, and they seemed against the penalty. They didn’t think such an important tournament could be won on the basis of a controversial call—it all came down to whether Perisic could have moved his hand out of the way. I don’t think anyone really thought he intentionally used his hands in that moment.
So with the score 2-1, and France having scored its only two goals in an unconventional fashion, it appeared that the ending might be unsatisfying. But France’s strikers came alive in the second half and erased any doubt about who was the better team. Paul Pogba and Kylian Mbappé both scored clean goals at the 59th and 65th minutes respectively.
Just when it seemed out of reach, Croatia scored once more. Mario Mandzukich found himself alone near the French goal when French goalie Hugo Lloris nonchalantly tapped the ball forward. Mandzukich made him pay for his laziness and knocked it in for Croatia’s second goal.
It could have been a colossal blunder in a closer game, but it was nothing more than a blip since the score was already 4-1 at the time. And it would be the game’s last goal, as the Croats seemed to run out of strength, losing the intensity with which they started the game, as the final minutes ticked away.
The day after Bastille Day, France’s national holiday, they were celebrating again. France is now only the sixth country to win the World Cup more than once. FIFA president Gianni Infantino was joined by the presidents of France, Croatia and Russia to present the trophies. The Golden Ball, the prize for the tournament’s best player, went to Croatia’s Luka Modric. Mbappé won the award for best young player in the tournament.
I should mention that Belgium won its game against England on Saturday by a score of 2-0. Belgium therefore takes second in this year’s tournament. Their goals bracketed the game, as Thomas Meunier scored just four minutes into play and Eden Hazard scored the second goal at 82 minutes.
The 2018 tournament has just finished, so you sports fans know what comes immediately after—and I mean, within hours, minutes of the final whistle. What happens? That’s right: the debate begins about who is favored to win in 2022. And the early word is that Brazil is favored to win, but France is also expected to be a contender to repeat as their core team matures and reaches its peak. There will be plenty of time to debate that before the next World Cup in 2022 in Qatar—the desert. The high temperature today in Doha, Qatar is 45 degrees Celcius, 113 degrees Fahrenheit. For that reason, the tournament will be played in November 2022, when the average high in Qatar is a much more manageable 30 degrees Celcius, or 86 degrees Fahrenheit. Still hot—so if France wants to repeat, maybe they can start training in French-speaking Algeria to get used to the climate.
Of course just before this World Cup we learned the host of the 2026 tournament—or, hosts I should say. Canada, the United States, and Mexico will all team up to co-host that tournament.
Let me leave you soccer fans with a good quote about today’s game. This is Karí Tulinius writing for London’s newspaper called The Guardian. Karí said: “The final was a tale of two games. One had two good teams duking it out, with three beautiful goals. The other was the weirdest game of football I have ever seen, featuring pitch invaders, VAR, Mandzukic scoring at both ends, and world leaders in a downpour of rain and glitter. Mind you, France won both 2-1.”
This was a long episode and JR and I need to get the transcript up on the web site, edit the audio and publish so you all have it on Monday morning, so let’s skip the English phrase just for today.
Before say goodbye for the day, I wanted to send a couple of hello’s out to listeners. Special hello to Abdiel from Sonoro, Mexico and Catrina from Brazil. Thanks for being in the audience Abdiel and Catrina.
We have an episode coming out on Wednesday and Friday of this week, and then next week we’ll be back to our Monday and Thursday schedule, so you’ll have plenty of opportunities to learn some good English phrases. What do we have coming up? We have “strike a chord” “gather steam” and “brace yourself”—those are the next phrases you’ll learn on upcoming episodes. So make sure you don’t miss any of them.
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