The Soccer 100: Zinedine Zidane — The summer of 2006 and the love of an old flame

As part of our buildup to the 2026 FIFA men’s World Cup in the United States, Canada and Mexico, we are publishing excerpted chapters from The Soccer 100, The Athletic’s definitive book on the 100 greatest players of all time, courtesy of HarperCollins Publishers.

The 10 players we will feature are the highest-ranked World Cup winners among our 100. Today’s article takes us back to the summer of 2006, and a tournament in Germany that will be remembered for the impact, both positive and negative, of one man.

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Imagine Zinédine Zidane at home, in the dead of night, having a mysterious conversation with a person or force he has vowed to never name.

This was the scenario that compelled him to come out of retirement for one last dance with Les Bleus. It makes sense that it happened this way — suitably enigmatic. It would not be right for a player of his supernatural style to suddenly rewrite his story in a mundane way. That wouldn’t do.

Zidane had withdrawn from international football in the summer of 2004. His place in the pantheon of French football was supremely established as the man who epitomized the 1998 World Cup, bringing France’s first star on their shirt, and followed it up with an imperious exhibition of his mastery as they won the European Championship two years later.

He was the symbol of an extraordinary era of French football, with his face illuminating the Arc de Triomphe as crowds sang for “Zizou Président.” He had done enough, hadn’t he?

No, intoned the voice to Zidane. With his country flailing in their pitiful attempts to qualify for the 2006 World Cup, at the age of 33, Zidane underwent his change of heart.

He explained it all to an astonished public on his website: “One night, at 3am, I suddenly woke up and I then spoke with someone. Until I die, I will never tell. This is just too crazy. This is someone that you will probably never meet. During the hours that followed, I was on my own with that person, at home, and I took the decision to come back. I had never experienced that before. I felt pushed by this force which dictated my behaviour. It was a revelation for me. I had to obey that voice that was advising me.”

Zidane and two of his experienced compatriots who had also said their farewells to international football, Lilian Thuram and Claude Makélélé, agreed to return together to fix France’s broken team. The news was greeted like a religious happening. This second-coming made those whose faith was waning find renewed belief. Even within the camp, the impact was extraordinary.

Thierry Henry did not hold back when asked how he felt about the return of Zidane. “What I am going to say may sound over the top, but it’s the truth: God exists, and he has returned to the France team.”

These three prodigal sons helped to pull the team from a perilous position in the qualification table to finish as group winners.

The rekindling of an old love affair was aflame.

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There is a reason that two artists, Douglas Gordon and Philippe Parreno, chose Zidane as the focus of their film in 2005. It was an interesting idea: to follow one player within a team game, in real time, for the duration of a match.

They used 17 synchronized cameras to capture every detail of their subject’s performance during a La Liga match between Real Madrid and Villarreal to make ‘Zidane: A 21st Century Portrait’. Such is the nature of live art; there are no guarantees of any particular drama, depth, or outcome. As it happened, Zidane was observed jogging and scanning for much of the film. But because it zooms in on its central character, what the movie does not easily transmit is the perspective of how he interpreted the game in relation to all the moving parts around him, which was a key part of his magic.

He did provide a chipped assist for Ronaldo, and for his part in a ruckus at the end of the game, he was sent off. But those things were almost incidental or accidental. The film is more a study of a player who possesses a certain magnetism, a certain allure. That is why he was the obvious choice for that kind of project, ahead of any of his skilled contemporaries.

We could watch Zidane, we could study Zidane, we could love Zidane, but we couldn’t easily get beneath the surface to understand what he was really like.

Zidane played with an inimitable kind of measured grace. A lot of great footballers capture the imagination with their dynamism or sparks of brilliance. Zidane seemed to be communing with the ball in a cerebral fashion — as if he identified how to tame it or manipulate it just ahead of time, which made it all the easier to bewilder an opponent with a clever movement or gossamer touch.

It’s a fascination, really, to wonder how much of greatness is spontaneous and how much comes from intelligence and practice. Is there really time to think during the intense perpetual motion of a match? Zidane considered that during a chat with The Athletic in 2023.

“When I am on the pitch, it is instinctive,” he said. “I didn’t have special rituals. I didn’t feel the pressure. I was just happy to be there on the pitch and to play in front of 50 or 80,000 people. It was my dream since I was little. To come out and play in front of 80,000 people? Imagine that! That’s what’s incredible.”

Germany, the World Cup’s host country in 2006, was the destination for one last, captivating, summertime fling for Zidane and France.

He had already clarified that this would be the end, his finale, and that he would retire from the game completely at the end of the tournament. There were extra layers of scrutiny on him — Zidane in ordinary circumstances existed under a brighter spotlight than most anyway. Add the comeback storyline and the swansong, and it was impossible to watch France at that World Cup without focusing on the main man.

The French began the group stage with two underwhelming draws, against Switzerland and South Korea. Their football was slumbering, stuttering. L’Équipe caught the mood of the nation with a plaintive headline: “And Now What Do We Do?” A quarter of a million people responded to a poll in the same newspaper querying whether France could reach the final, and 88 per cent of them replied in the negative. Oof.

The team did the necessary against Togo in their third and last match to advance from the group phase, but overall there had been scant evidence of a theatrical farewell, with a fitting flourish, for Zidane.

On to the knockouts, and suddenly the dynamic changed. The reins were loosened and the horse began to gallop and flare its nostrils.

When Spain met France in the last 16 in Hanover, it was arguably the tie of the round.

There was an energy in the stadium, and the Spanish took the lead early. France looked deep into themselves — there was abundant talent in the squad to show far more than they had managed under their eccentric coach Raymond Domenech. It was on the players, and they knew it. After a problematic qualification and a boring group stage, they were now losing in the first knockout round. They essentially took over from within, with Zidane the controller-in- chief.

The response was, well, magnifique. Franck Ribéry equalized. Then Zidane floated over a free kick that found its way to Patrick Vieira to head France into the lead. Next came the moment that transformed the collective belief. They didn’t just win, they won with Zidane adding the maestro’s touch. It was confirmation they could soar again.

In stoppage time, Zidane powered up the left wing and gathered the ball under his spell. The temperature inside the stadium spiked. Everyone’s eyes widened, their breath quickened. He chopped the ball past Carles Puyol, leaned in, and thumped his strike past Iker Casillas. His face in celebration was the epitome of a wise old head showing the kids how it’s done.

L’Équipe did another poll about final chances after the game and the swing was impressive — 90 per cent now reckoned yes, the resurrected France could make it after all.

Next? Brazil.

Frankfurt was the setting for a quarterfinal matchup with deep emotional resonance. Zidane and Ronaldo, whose fortunes had been entwined in such contrasting ways back in the 1998 World Cup final, met again.

There was a picture for the ages as they faced each other just before kickoff. They shared a private joke and giggled like children without a care. When you live the life they do, there are not many who can empathize with your experience, but their shared history made for a moment to reflect that probably nobody outside the pair of them could quite grasp.

Zidane played like a dream. Like an actor in his last scene or a musician strumming his final chord, he loved it. He had fun — in a game of this magnitude. From the off, he pirouetted and eased away to roaring approval from the audience. He orchestrated French progress by carving open the decisive move of the match. His arcing free kick picked out Henry for the winner. It was a mythical performance, one to be always remembered.

A semifinal against Portugal in Munich connected with more powerful memories from Zidane’s past. A penalty sealed it. Zidane made it look effortless. He had done the same from 12 yards against the same country at the same stage in the European Championship in 2000. That had been an extreme psychological test, as his opponents back then lost their heads and threatened to leave the pitch, such was their rage about the award of a penalty in the final moments of extra time — a point of no return.

He had to wait several minutes and barely moved. When teammates came to talk to him to offer advice or encouragement, he shut them out. He stayed in his zone. Those moments are deeply personal. “I don’t listen. I don’t listen because I’m the one who’s going to shoot. It’s my responsibility. It’s me who knows what I have to do. It’s not for someone else to tell me what I have to do,” he explained.

Those couple of weeks of the knockout rounds at Germany 2006 were like a holiday romance, where Zidane and France were entranced with one another. So when the final came around, it felt like destiny was watching.

Italy. The final hurrah with the World Cup at stake. Zidane’s blue halo was intact when he stood over the penalty to give France the lead. He elected for a power Panenka off the crossbar. He made it look easy. It was Godfather of Football stuff. But then, infamously, deviltry came into play.

The Italian Marco Materazzi was an agent provocateur, tossing out words about Zidane’s family like a grenade set to spew forth a red mist. Zidane charged his head into the defender’s chest. It was instinctive, emotional, and as a climax to a brilliant career, utterly shocking. The scene as Zidane brushed past the golden trophy on its plinth, taunting him as he exited toward the dressing room, had the impact of Shakespearean tragedy.

As the saying goes, there is no great genius without some touch of madness.

Naturally, some of the criticism was sharp and pained. How could France’s beloved icon falter like that? How could it be explained? Won’t anybody think of the children? Yet back in Paris, after Italy won that World Cup on penalties, thousands of ordinary fans flocked to the Place de la Concorde and chanted for their fallen hero: “Zizou!”

Zidane’s summer of love ended with a dark act of passion.

His headbutt is a defining image, but it is craziness of another kind for that to in any way sum up Zidane’s place in football.

He was a wonder, a creator, a warrior, a poet on the pitch. He remains the footballing god to whom Henry referred; only he showed himself to be human after all.

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Excerpted from The Soccer 100 by Oliver Kay & James Horncastle with The Athletic Soccer Staff, published by William Morrow. Copyright © 2025 by The Athletic Media Company. Reprinted courtesy of HarperCollins Publishers.