It is the mystery every athlete, coach and sports fan would love to solve: What made Zinédine Zidane snap?
The head butt that sent France's captain out of the World Cup final put an ignoble end to a remarkable career, but sympathy from Canadian sports analysts yesterday could not make up for their conclusion. Mr. Zidane is a professional. It should never have happened.
Two factors increase the pressure on any athletes, said Peter Jensen, chief executive of Rockwood-based Performance Coaching Inc: uncertainty of the outcome and the importance of the event.
The greater either factor is, the more susceptible a person is to losing control, he said. Mr. Zidane was injured, retiring and staring down a World Cup-deciding penalty shootout. Then Italian defender Marco Materazzi approached.
Whatever happened next, Mr. Jensen said it was up to Mr. Zidane to maintain his self-control.
"I suspect the other players tried a lot of things, and as Zidane walked away that time Materazzi was able to find the right button. Somebody hit a hot trigger," Mr. Jensen said.
"The higher your arousal levels, the narrower your focus level gets. When it gets too high, we can't access our brain. It's called choking. He clearly had France on his shoulders. Perhaps the weight got to him."
Canadian silver-medalist runner Molly Killingbeck said athletes are expected to deal with tough situations, but sometimes the human being inside the sports star breaks through.
"When you get to the limit, you snap," she said. "As an athlete it's what you're trained to do [handle pressure], but there's always going to be that one time. . ."
University of Alberta associate professor of physical education and recreation Billy Strean called it a warning to players of all levels not to lose their cool.
But in the end, Prof. Strean said the onus was on Mr. Zidane.
"We all have breaking points. We all have a place where we can't cope," he said. But whatever happens, he continued, players have a choice.
"Whenever you're facing an elite performance in sport or otherwise, you need to be prepared for all the different stresses and challenges. The psyche is one of the elements of the game, getting the opponent to think off task. Some people never make it to that [elite] environment because they don't have the ability to deal with that."
John DeBenedictis of the National Soccer Coaches Association of Canada agreed that "verbal shtick" is part of sport, but he discouraged younger players from goading the opposition.
Young athletes are coached to show their might through actions, not words, but he said ultimately he can do little if his players do the taunting, apart from try to talk them out of it.
"Sometimes the object is to try and take the other team's best players or most dangerous players out of the game. You see it at all levels, where players snap or players purposely say something," Mr. DeBenedictis said.
