A L S O _T O D A Y The Cup runneth over and over By Ethan Zindler Professional scalpers and amateur partyers in Marseille World Cup From the stadium to the bar stool, watch for our ongoing reports T A B L E_T A L K How much should a plane ticket cost? Where can travelers get the best deals? Share your tips and tales in the Wanderlust area of Table Talk R E C E N T L Y Hog heaven By David Kohn At the Memphis World Championship Barbecue Cooking Contest (07/03/98) Mondo Weirdo Nude Beach of the Week Readers bare all on an isolated Maui beach -- and in the heart of Munich (07/03/98) Yankee, go home! By Michaela Griffin Being an American expatriate in Beijing was great -- until the president's visit (07/02/98) Jazz swings into Beijing By Dan Ouellette Even better than President Clinton, jazz in China is spreading a message of liberty (07/01/98) Among the hooligans By Ethan Zindler World Cup scenes: Threat and theft among the hooligans in Lens, France (06/30/98) Browse the Wanderlust Feature archives		WORLD CUP SCENES . | . PAGE 1, 2 Of course, it's not the Serbs who have brought most of the supposedly nationalist violence to France this summer. No one does soccer violence in the name of their country better than the English. The French have taken note of this. We had been late getting to our rented farmhouse in the tiny village of St. Cernin because we took a few wrong turns on the way past fields of sunflowers and red-brick churches. Madame Lacaze, the owner, suspected something more sordid had held us up. "I wondered if they had stopped you at the airport because of all the hooligans," she said in French, addressing our group of 10 English and Scottish guests. Not only have the English exported hooligans to France, they have also exported the word. The French for "hooligan" is hooligan. Tony Blair is right, of course: Most English fans, at home or abroad, are perfectly good-natured in their fanatical support of their national team. For example, not an hour goes by in this farmhouse without someone's discussing the World Cup. We have estimated that about a quarter of all our conversations have evolved around football. The five women in the group are as vocal as the men. When the second-round games finished and the World Cup had two days off, one of our group wondered aloud, "What are we going to do?" The night before we flew to France from London, some of us gathered around the television at Kate and her boyfriend John's apartment in the East End to watch England play Colombia. When England scored, John hit the mute button and we could hear the roaring from the Hayfield pub around the corner. The pub was packed, even after the game. Women wrapped themselves in English flags and men stood around analyzing the game. "It was brilliant. We were very nervous but after the first goal we relaxed," said Tony, 26, a sound engineer and a lager man. And how important was the match? "It's life or death really, innit?" It sounds like the Hayfield is a good place to watch England play. "You should have been here last time, for the Romania match. When England scored, this couple started having sex on the table," said 23-year-old Antonio, an events promoter and sometime fan of Italy, thanks to his first-generation Italian immigrant father. Like a lot of soccer fans, Antonio is an amateur sociologist. "The World Cup unifies the country," he said, grinning over his pint of lager at the Hayfield. "With the Church of England in decline people are looking for some new beliefs. Football is something we can look to now." The Church of English Football might have been flourishing that Friday night as England beat Colombia 2-0, but on Tuesday the 30th, the holy had to face their great Satan -- Argentina. For some reason, that absurd little victory in the Falklands war still lingers in the hearts of many British people. Perhaps it's because Argentina repeatedly does to England on the football field what it couldn't do in the Falklands: It wins. "The French made the weapons the Argentinians used in the Falklands," announced Sylvain, Madame Lacaze's son, as he sat around our table watching the match with us on Tuesday evening. We had the TV set up so that all 10 of us, plus three Frenchmen and an Albanian working for Sylvain, could watch while we ate barbecued chicken, lamb and sausages and poured copiously from clay jugs of red wine. "You're a brave man, Sylvain," I told him. "Allez l'Argentine!" he called out, jumping up from his seat. So I obliged by chasing him around the farmhouse grounds. He gloated when the referee gave Argentina an absurd penalty against England after a couple of minutes. He cawed when they equalized after England went 2-1 up. He shouted with joy when Argentina won on penalties after extra time. As we played table tennis afterward, I remember his bringing up the Falklands again. But that was after a few too many jugs of wine had been emptied. It's an odd thing for me to feel so warmly toward the English team. In World Cups past I've been delighted at their failures and infuriated by their successes. It's a Scottish thing. But this year the team was different. They had Michael Owen, surely the most exciting player in the world -- and only 18 years old. And they had David Beckham, creative and dashing and regularly referred to in the sports pages of serious British newspapers as the future Mr. Posh Spice. Like their teammates, they're extremely likable lads, on and off the pitch. On Thursday night I dreamed about their boss, the England coach, Glenn Hoddle. He stood in a crowd with his girlfriend. I touched him on the shoulder and he ignored me. He was tall, dressed as ever in a running suit and clearly depressed. I tried again and he turned round. "You did a great job," I said. "I'm very sorry for your loss." He smiled. "Thanks," he said. The dream makes me wonder if the tipsy Antonio might have been onto something. Recently, the British have warmed to events that they can share equally. First came the jubilation of the Labor Party's victory in the general election just over a year ago. Princess Diana's death then bound the country together in ways that had people talking about a Britain forever changed. And now the fate of the Scottish and English teams had millions of people taking days off work and streets deserted. "The casualty rooms will be packed right now," said Lade, a doctor, just a few minutes after England lost. "I remember in Euro '96 (the European Championships) when England lost. We didn't have a single beep for two hours, and then after the final whistle it was pandemonium." I could be wrong but the evidence here in sleepy St. Cernin doesn't suggest that French emergency rooms will be facing the same rush if and when France is eliminated. After watching the first half of the second round-game between France and Paraguay at the farmhouse on Sunday, all 10 of us piled into two cars and drove to nearby Labastide-Murat so that we could watch the game at a local cafe and share the joys and agonies of the local French fans. As we drove through St. Cernin we noticed a group of old men playing petanque, the French version of bowling. Their national team was facing elimination or entry to the quarterfinals and they were more concerned with getting their patterned steel balls closest to the little wooden ball. We parked in the main square and walked into the cafe. A young woman sat alone drinking a beer. Two old men sat together in silence. A woman stood behind the bar and a dog slowly came out from behind her to see who had arrived. "Hello," I said. "Do you have a television? We were hoping to watch the match." "No, I'm sorry," she said. "Is there another place we could try?" I asked. "Everywhere is closed," she said. "But tomorrow you could try the hotel around the corner." Maybe the game just didn't matter to people here. Maybe they are more respectful of Sunday traditions than the British. Maybe everyone was watching at home. Whatever the case, the France vs. Paraguay game was certainly not a focal point for national togetherness the way the England vs. Colombia game was at the Hayfield pub. And, I suspect, in every pub in England. That's exhibit A in the case to prove that the French don't care as much about football as the Brits do. Here's exhibit B: It was breathtakingly easy to buy tickets for the match in Toulouse. The four of us had no idea if we would just have to sit in a bar and watch the game, after traveling more than three hours to Toulouse. As it was, we were deluged with offers of tickets and couldn't believe our luck when we bought four tickets for face value, at $45 each. I was prepared to pay $300. OK, so it was just Holland vs. Yugoslavia, but if the game had been held in Manchester, say, scalped tickets at face value would have been a fantasy. And finally, exhibit C: Opera. The authorities in Montpellier set up an outdoor opera production at the opposite end of the town square from the massive screen that showed the England vs. Colombia game to the straggling English fans. "Every now and then there would be a lull in play and we'd hear some soprano burst through at the top of her voice," said Anne-Marie. Let's get this clear: If the World Cup is ever held in Britain again, I can personally guarantee that there will be no opera performances going on anywhere near one of these large screens erected for ticketless fans. Nationalistic passion counts for nothing, though, when you lose. France is in. England is out. Scotland has long since ignored the pleas of its official pop song -- "Don't Come Home Too Soon." So we have to find someone else to cheer for. Many teams seem unworthy of our support. Every reason we can come up with for not supporting a team is political -- and petty. Croatia is unacceptable to Rich, who calls them "glorified Serbs" and notes their collaboration with the Nazis and their own recent war crimes. Argentina is an obvious no-no. Germany? Uh, don't think so. Brazil -- well, their police kill their street children with apparent tacit approval and they don't protect their rain forests. France had a collaborative government during the War. Italy had Mussolini. So that leaves Holland and Denmark. Yawn. Politics may creep into football, but who wants a PC World Cup? Hardly anyone would qualify. So we'll probably pull for France, Brazil or Italy for the rest of the tournament. After all, what's Radovan Karadzic got to do with football? SALON | July 7, 1998 Matthew McAllester is a reporter for Newsday. Discuss the World Cup in Table Talk's International Issues area.