Lawyers to Matrix: You Got to Get Your Game Face On!*

*Note: This headline only works when read in the voice of Avery Johnson, so please indulge me and read it that way before you move on. Thank you.

It was so long ago you could be forgiven for forgetting the whole thing, but way back in 2006 there was a World Cup and, in the final game, this dude named “Zizou” headbutted another guy called “Matrix” in the chest. The reason for the attack was never made clear, but the rumors ranged from racist slurs to nasty comments about Zizou’s sister and the suggestion that the Frenchman’s youngest son might not actually be his (Pippo, I’m looking at you). Since this was Zizou, the possibility that he was just frustrated and tired and wanted to be out of the game never occurred to anyone but me, and all the media assumed Matrix had done something to deserve the giant bruise in the middle of his chest.

Now, though, Matrix is fighting back: Not with the top of his head (because he’s a sophisticated fellow, not a mindless brute), but in a courtroom, with highly paid, well-dressed litigators by his side. He’s suing a trio of English tabloids — The Sun, The Daily Mail and The Daily Star — which all professed to have accurate transcripts of the on-pitch conversation leading to Zizou’s attack, and blamed the whole thing on Matix. Needless to say, the poor Azzurri man “suffered enormous damage to his reputation as a result of the press reports,” and is hoping getting paid will help him begin to get over his pain. (And, if all goes well, there will be several awesome corrections published, something at which the English tabloids excel.)

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Category: Azzurri, Serie A