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World Cup Final: World Cup finals should be like an elegant word placed at the end of the last line of the last verse of an epic poem. The word should be just right and when it is read there should be no choice but to pause in wonder as all that has gone before makes sweet sense.

There are lots of bad poems out there and there have been lots of poor World Cup finals. France and Italy brought old European values and a sense of romance to Berlin last night and they had the class to attempt some poetry. It ended, though, in a scream, a guttural howl out of sync with everything that went before. It ended with an Italian World Cup victory, delivered through the medium of perfectly-taken penalties. It ended but there's lots more we will be hearing about.