2006 FIFA World Cup (TM)

Shilton's England column

What a night! Italy win the World Cup final on penalties and Zinedine Zidane, one of the greatest players to have ever lived, playing his last ever game of professional football, gets himself sent off for an unbelievably outrageous head butt. We couldn't have asked for a more dramatic end to a fabulous tournament.

What on earth was Zidane thinking? I couldn't believe what I was seeing. He must have completely lost all sense of where he was, and what the occasion was, to do something as ridiculous as that. He just saw the red mist. It was incredible.

For a man of his experience to do something like that - with the game poised as it was and at such a poignant moment in his career - was truly unbelievable to see. I cannot believe he would take such a chance, because surely he will have known he was going to get sent off. There's no doubt whatsoever that it was massively irresponsible.

And it wasn't as if he did something that was ever going to hurt Marco Materazzi. It wasn't a violent kick or a butt to the head. It was just an impetuous act of aggression that was never going to injure the fella, but was always going to be a red card offence. It was crazy!

There's no doubt the ref was right to send Zidane off, but if the fourth official told the referee out on the pitch what had happened only after seeing it on a TV replay – as is being rumoured – then he actually shouldn't have been dismissed. It's trial by replay, which is not in the rules and seems very erroneous to me.

As it happens, you could see by the way the French lads finished the game that the incident didn't affect them. They just carried on playing as if nothing had happened. And they can count themselves very unlucky not to have won the game. There was a lot of tension in the match and neither team wanted to lose it, but overall France were the better side and shaded it for me.

Italy weren't as bright as normal; they looked jaded, a little bit under par, and the spark wasn't quite there – a result I think of their gruelling semi-final against the Germans. But all credit to them. They held firm, hung on in there and struck five magnificent penalties.

In fact, all nine penalty takers showed a lot of bottle and the quality of the shoot-out was superb. And it's not as if David Trezeguet hit a bad penalty. He struck it well, and six inches the other way it would have gone in. Somebody had to miss and unfortunately for him, it was his, and France's turn to have the bad luck.

Even though Italy weren't the best team on the night, I think they were the best side in the competiton overall and I don't begrudge them their triumph. They had all the necessary qualities to win it and they stood up to everything that was thrown at them throughout the tournament. They were not the most attack-minded side, but the goalkeeper and defenders were superb and you need that to win trophies. They are a very organised and solid unit and can be very proud of what they've achieved.

What's crazy now is that by the middle of the week some of these World Cup winners could actually be playing in the Italian third division because of the match-fixing scandal which has engulfed their country's football. It's an unbelievable situation they find themselves in and it's hard to imagine what it could be like for them to go from the amazing high they are on now, to what could be the lowest point of their careers.

But football's like that. It can lift you one minute and then it can kick you in the teeth. What they must remember is no-one can ever take their World Cup winners' medal off them. In 30 years time the scandal will be forgotten, but no-one will ever forget that they won the World Cup.

And no-one will forget the 2006 World Cup either. The organisation of the tournament was a credit to the Germans, there were some fantastic games and we saw some great examples of skill and talent.

But the fussy refereeing and the play-acting spoilt it a bit for me. It really took the gloss off the competition and showed all that is wrong with the game.

It was a disappointing tournament for England as well, but I think we have a lot to look forward to. Both the players and management need to perform better, but there's no doubt there is a lot of talent at Steve's McClaren's disposal and I think we have a chance of emulating Italy and winning the World Cup in 2010.