Faruk Pasic

The Aesthetics of Zidane�s Ultimate Goal

 

Unfortunately, if I were to mention the name Zinedine Zidane to an average person on the street today, I would probably receive a comment about his infamous head butt during this year’s FIFA World Cup.  Many people seem to forget that the enormous outrage over Zidane’s foul play originated to a large degree from the shock about the fact that such an established and experienced player, the undisputed icon of European world-class soccer of the last decade (next to perhaps David Beckham), would resort to such a violent attack.  My point is that besides being a head-butting butthead, Zidane was also responsible for some of the greatest moments in soccer history and one of the most beautiful goals scored in the last ten years.

Since I have now used the word “beauty” in the last sentence, I should discuss what it is about athletic activities that can be considered beautiful.  Despite Gumbrecht’s valid claim that there was a discontinuity in the world of sports between the end of the classic period and the late 18th century, the most striking feature of the aesthetics of sports in Western culture today is probably that our concept of what an athletic human body should look like is still very much comparable to the Greek ideal of an athlete, as the statue of a Greek discus thrower suggests.  This is worth noting because tastes have changed drastically in other forms of aesthetic experiences over the same period of time.  For example, with the invention of photography, it became less important for artists to be able to paint realistic landscapes because there was a more effective method of capturing the same landscape more accurately.  Thus, painting moved to ever more abstract forms in the 20th century.  When it comes to ideas about athletic beauty, however, little seems to have changed.  Much of this has probably to do with the discussion about skill that came up in the last meeting.  One simply values an object or an activity much more if one can recognize how much work and effort was actually needed in its production.  The perceived value of this object or work only increases if, in addition, its production involved a set of skills that only few of us possess, or if it involved skills which can only be obtained through years of practice.  This is true today as much as it was in ancient Greece, where Olympic winners were recognized for their exceptional skills by being given lifelong pensions.  Seeing an athlete perform an action that would be impossible to perform for the large majority of the viewing public arouses a distinct sense of awe in the spectator.  Thus, both athletes and their actions become works of art, exhibited in the large museums that we call stadiums.

 

That said, I can finally talk about Zinedine Zidane and the “ultimate goal”, which he scored against Bayer Leverkusen in the 2002 UEFA Champions League final.  The scoring of this goal was a result of speed, precision, timing, and also – undoubtedly – a little bit of luck.  The beauty lies in the execution of the shot.  If one examines the situation closely, one will notice that the entire scene happened in roughly five seconds (from Roberto Carlos receiving the pass on the left wing to the moment when the ball lands in the net).  In order for this action to work smoothly in such a short amount of time, the players must possess “blind” precision and good timing, namely knowing where and how to play the ball and where exactly to stand without even having to look.  Before lobbing the ball into the penalty box, Roberto Carlos never even looks up.  The ball sails in a large arc to Zidane, who is waiting at the exactly correct position on the other side of the pass.  Similarly to Roberto Carlos, Zidane’s eyes are only on the ball.  His glance only shifts towards the goal after the ball has already left his foot.  Such ability to estimate the ball’s path is rare even among the elite class of soccer players and simply leaves the spectator speechless.

 

It would be wrong, however, to ascribe the aesthetic value of the “ultimate goal” only to the players’ skills.  While the skills are the reason why one would be impressed with the scene, there is a certain aspect to the movement of the ball and the motion of the player himself that makes the scored goal a truly beautiful sight.  Observing the path of the ball after it is released from Zidane’s foot, one will notice the curved path that it takes to reach the net.  The path of the ball bends outward, curving around the powerless goalkeeper, and lands in the net behind him.  There is something inherently beautiful about the curved shape of the path that the ball takes.  It could be the simple precision of the geometric shape, which one usually does not encounter as such in nature, which evokes a feeling of admiration and praise in the viewer.  It could also be the smooth and fluid movement of the ball that appeals to one’s senses, especially because the fluid motion is combined with power and speed.

 

One can observe an aesthetic of motion in Zidane’s movements as well.  As the pass is flying towards him from the left wing, Zidane faces almost the exact opposite direction of the goal as he “winds up” his foot for the shot.  He then releases his foot and performs a 270-degree turn, hitting the ball at the exactly correct moment.  In this turn Zidane combines power, speed, precision, and timing.  It is a similar motion to that which an ice skater would perform before a jump.  Zidane takes the disorientation and chaos out of the spin and exerts control over it without losing any of the spin-kick’s power.  The fluidity of the spin remains while its inherent unpredictability has been eliminated.  This control of the uncontrollable represents the beauty of the ultimate goal.  It is that to which Gumbrecht refers as the epiphany of the play.

 

Sources:

Greek Disc Thrower:  http://lib.lbcc.edu/images/greece/discthrower-greek-450bc.jpg