Below are our picks for the 2006 “Coach Jay” World Cup Awards, which recognize outstanding and unusual achievement on The Beautiful Game’s greatest stage.
The awards’ namesake is our father Jay, who has devoted half his life to the sport of soccer as a coach, teacher, referee, spectator and philosopher. We’ve elaborated on his traditional awards to the point of unrecognizability, but we hope the spirit still honors him, and perhaps occasions a guffaw.
You may want to take a look at the 2002 awards first. These were our first attempt, and many of the awards have been carried over to this year.
PDF editions are available from the above menu. If you need the Adobe reader, you can find it here. (If you'd like to link to this page, you should use www.entropycentral.net)
Nominees
Best Performance by a Striker Nobody’s Ever Heard Of
a. Jose Fonseca
b. Agustin Delgado
c. Asamoah Gyan
d. Lukas Podolski
Worst Performance by a Striker Everybody’s Heard Of (“The Batistuta”)
a. Andrei Schevchenko
b. Didier Drogba
c. Pauleta
d. Ruud Van Nistlerooy
Worst Performance by an Attacking Midfielder Everybody’s Heard Of
a. Frank Lampard
b. Francesco Totti
c. Zinedine Zidane
d. Landon Donovan
The Lebensraum Award
a. Miroslav Klose
b. Gerard Asamoah
c. Oliver Neuville
d. Lukas Podolski
The Bora Milutinovic Overachievement in Coaching Award
a. Ratomir Dujkovic (Ghana)
b. Guus Hiddink (Australia/PSV Eindhoven)
c. Jurgen Klinsmann (Germany)
d. Koebi Kuhn (Switzerland)
The “Where Have You Gone, Joe DiMaggio?/A Nation Turns Its Lonely Eyes to You (Woo Woo Woo)” Award
a. Robert Pires
b. Fernando Morientes
c. Edgar Davids
d. Zinedine Zidane
Honorable Mentions: Clint Mathis, and that non-existent target man that everyone in England thinks Sven should have brought
Least Fortunate Country Abbreviation
a. S&M
b. ARG
c. GHA
d. USA
Best Ronaldo Impression
a. Ronaldo (Cristiano)
b. Ronaldinho
c. Robinho
d. Ronaldo
The Dunga Hard Man Midfield Award
a. Torsten Frings
b. Michael Essien
c. Claude Makalele
d. Gennaro Gattuso
The Roberto Carlos Award for Most Overlaps
a. Miguel
b. Fabio Grosso
c. Nuno Valente
d. Gianluca Zambrotta
Best Match of the Cup
a. Trinidad v. Sweden (0-0)
b. Australia v. Japan (3-1)
c. Tunisia v. Saudi Arabia (2-2)
d. France v. Brazil (1-0)
Best Goal
a. Bastian Schweinsteiger v. Portugal (56’)
b. Tomas Rosicky v. USA (36’)
c. Maxi Rodriguez v. Mexico (98’)
d. Tim Cahill v. Japan (85’ to tie)
Best Goal by a Defender
a. Fabio Grosso v. Germany (119’)
b. Phillippe Senderos v. South Korea (23’)
c. Robert Alaya v. Germany (49’)
d. Cristian Zaccardo v. USA (27’)
Best US Striker
a. Brian McBride
b. Cristian Zaccardo
The Roy Lassiter Award for Worst Miss of a Sitter
a. Thierry Henry v. South Korea (85’)…slotting this would have given Zidane his only assist from open play the entire Cup, tying him with CAFU at a whopping 2.
b. Atsushi Yanigasawa v. Croatia (51’)…tried a stylish finish with the outside of his foot, for which he clearly didn’t have the skill. Blame this one on Zico’s influence—or maybe this is the price you pay for wanting to be Brazil.
c. Luis Figo v. France (78’)…Barthez now owes him his first-born or a kidney
d. Frank Ribery v. Togo…(1’ – 77’)…just pick one.
e. Frank Lampard (World Cup 2006)
Stingiest Defense
a. England
b. France
c. Portugal
d. Fabio Cannavaro
The Joe Theismann “Gotta Be Bad Luck Just Seeing a Thing Like That” Award
a. Michael Owen
b. Jan Koller
c. Djibril Cisse
d. Skippy *
The Paraguay ‘02 Ugliest Uniform Award
a. Paraguay
b. Croatia
c. Gianluigi Buffon’s Keeper Jersey (“I didn’t know Puma made V-neck cardigans.”—JDF)
d. Angola (“I know U-8 teams that wouldn’t wear that jersey.”—JDF “Hey, at least they got the Jiffy Lube patch removed.”—AKF)
Disqualified: Ecuador (All six of the jerseys they made their kit from were rather nice)
Not the Group of Death
a. Group C
b. Group C
c. Group C
d. Group C
Worst FIFA Awards
a. Hernan Crespo: Silver Boot
b. Portugal: Most Entertaining Team
c. Zinedine Zidane: Golden Ball
d. Francesco Totti: All-Star 23 selection
e. Italy: World Champions
Best Unfinished Thought Award
a. “This is great! We’ve tied it up, I’m dominating in the air, we’ve really got ‘em on their heels. So, I’ll just win this header…” SMACK! (Brian McBride v. Italy)
b. “This is great! We made the final! So, I’ll just…” CRASH! (Thierry Henry v. Italy)
c. “This is great! I actually got away with calling Zidane’s mother a…” THUD! (Marco Materazzi v. France)
d. “This is great! We actually scored first! Now if we can just get through the next hour…” KER-RONALDO! (Keiji Tamada v. Brazil)
Most Unpleasant-Sounding Occupation
a. Schweinsteiger
b. Metzelder
c. Hitzlsperger
d. Mertesacker
Most Victimized By Curse from Paolo Maldini’s Mom
a. Alessandro Nesta
b. Marco Materazzi
c. Daniele De Rossi
d. Raymond Domenech
British Invasion All-Stars
a. Oliver Kahn (Brian Jones of the Rolling Stones)
b. Fabricio Coloccini (Roger Daltrey of The Who)
c. Edwin van der Sar (any of The Kinks)
d. Graham Poll (Pete Best)
Best Line from Rounders
a. “Hangink around, Hangink around. Team’s got alligator blood.”
(South Korea v. France)
b. “You are officially never invited to our Cup again.”
(Portugal v. Everybody)
c. “Listen. Here’s the thing: if you can’t spot the sucker one match into the group phase, then you ARE the sucker.”
(USA v. Czech Republic)
d. “Just like a young man, coming in for a qvickie. I feel so…un-sya-tis-fyed.”
(Serbia & Montenegro)
e. JO: “Hey, call me—if you need a lawyer."
MIKE: “I will…And I will.”
(Zinedine Zidane)
Best Performance From Beyond the Grave
a. Figo
b. Lilian Thuram
c. Pavel Nedved
d. Oliver Kahn
Best Facial Scarring
a. Frank Ribery
b. Torsten Frings
c. Carlos Teves
d. Daniele De Rossi
Looney Tunes All-Stars
a. Croatia (Like Wile E. Coyote, should probably just have given up entirely)
b. Figo (as Pepe le Pew)
c. Ghana (who thought that tunnel was just painted on…until a train came speeding out)
d. Carlos Teves (as The Tasmanian Devil)
The Spain Memorial Underachievement Award
a. Czech Republic
b. Netherlands
c. USA
d. Poland
Honorable Mention: Spain
The Cameroon Memorial Award for African Overachievement
Ghana
The Nigeria Memorial Award for African Underachievement
Cote d’Ivoire
The Paraguay Memorial Award for South American Overachievement
Ecuador
Celebrity Category
Best Performance by Somebody Who Was Actually IN Rounders: Michael Ballack (Matt Damon)
Best Performance by “Malcolm in the Middle” Alumnus: Jens Lehmann (Brian Cranston)
Most Alarming Resemblance to Donald Pleasance: Fabien Barthez
Whose Card Is It Anyway?: Valentin Ivanov (Ryan Stiles)
Best Performance by a Hobbit: Maniche
Zinedine Zidane: Arjen Robben
Uncontested Awards
Mister Congeniality: Zinedine Zidane
Worst Performance by a Player Named Landon Donovan: Landon Donovan
Precision Diving Award: Portugal
Announcer Most Likely to Firebomb Bruce Arena’s House: Eric Wynalda
Toughest-Looking Jersey: Australia – Away (Turns black after five minutes)
The Eric Tognetti Award for Best Game to Watch on Painkillers: Switzerland v. Ukraine
Least-Inspired Brazilian Name: Fred
Longest Keeper with the Shortest Arms: Paul Robinson
Shortest Keeper with Longest Arms: Yoshikatsu Kawaguchi
Shortest Keeper with the Shortest Arms: Fabien Barthez
Single Biggest Setback to the Cause of Soccer in America: Marcelo Balboa’s commentary
Best Architectural Style: Deco
Best Conk: Didier Drogba
Best Match Report: US v. Italy, The Guardian Unlimited (UK)
“Full Time: Italy 1, USA 1…That’s the end of one of the most surreal matches in World Cup history…it was a talking dwarf and some gentle erotica away from being a David Lynch film.”
Best Joke that We Just Couldn’t Seem to Come Up With: “Toni Toni Toni”
Best Cup: Ricardo Carvalho
World Cup Logo: copyright FIFA
Mr. Yuk Symbol: copyright Children's Hospital of Pittsburgh
* Jesse’s friend Eric Tognetti, a co-rec player and referee in Seattle, WA, who conveniently blew his knee just in time to spend the Group Phase on his couch recovering from surgery. Best wishes for a speedy recovery, Skippy!