A nation takes to the streets to celebrate its almost unbelievable 3-0 victory over football's defending champions

By ROD USHER AND WENDELL STEAVENSON

ow are the mighty fallen! The reigning Champions Brazil--four-time winners of football's highest honor--beaten by the David who failed even to qualify for the last two World Cup finals. No wonder the French crowd heeded the call of captain Didier Deschamps when he asked them to turn the Stade de France into the Stade de Frenzy. Three-nil! A goal for each band of the tricolor.

And if the stadium in Paris was the epicenter, the waves of national euphoria spread right across the country; millions of giddy supporters spilled onto the streets and filled every fountain. The rest of the sporting world couldn't help but share some of their ecstasy. And didn't the world watch: the tournament drew an accumulated total of 37 billion television spectators.

Few thought France could do it. But the team with the best player in the world and 10 others not far behind him, was beaten by one less star-studded, but with enough determination to pull off the impossible dream.

The final ignored the script even before the kick-off. Billed as the world's best attack against the world's best defense, it was supposed to be a tight match that would be decided by the brilliance of Ronaldo, with help from Rivaldo et al. It didn't happen. In part, because just before the match, to the stunned gabbling of the pundits, Ronaldo's fitness appeared to be in doubt. And it might have been better for Brazil had he not been playing; his dodgy ankle left him a shadow of his true self. And the French had Zinedine Zidane--or ZZ Top, as he's now being called. The big midfielder of Algerian descent had a different plot in his head. By half time, his balding pate had speared two balls into the net. The Brazilian second-half comeback never came, and Zidane's team-mate Emmanuel Petit provided the coup de grace only minutes before the Moroccan referee blew the whistle that allowed President Jacques Chirac and most of his 60 million countrymen to leap from their seats in joy.

Around the world, few begrudged the French their moment. It was the culmination of a tournament it seemed the whole world was watching. England's Prince Harry jumped up from his seat in Lens when his country scored against Romania; the Pope is known to have a soft spot for goalkeepers, having been one in his youth in Poland; the Three Tenors happily sang a World Cup concert (it got them good tickets!); in China, President Clinton's visit was overshadowed by the biggest event in the world's most popular sport. On a radio show in Shanghai he had to field questions less about Monica Lewinsky than on his country's football failure against Iran. In Thailand, eight men escaped from prison while their guards were absorbed watching the Germany-Croatia gamel.

For the French themselves, the possibility of triomphe began to hit home after their team won the semifinal against Croatia--the cinderella of the tournament in its first entry to the Cup. After that game, 300,000 people took to the streets of Paris waving flags, faces painted red-white-and-blue and tooting their cars, this time for joy rather than in frustration at traffic gridlock. Nothing like it had been seen since the Liberation. And late Sunday night there were estimates of a million people packing the streets around the Champs Elysees. What a turn-around from the earlier French coolness that caused Chirac to give the nation a pep talk about all the world's eyes being on them as hosts. The success of the French team eventually put paid to any ambivalence. Well before Sunday's playoff impromptu parties were being celebrated in streets all over the country (It also worked for Chirac; his approval rating climbed 13 points to 68%). Opposition leader Philippe Seguin mused: "When you see all these French, seemingly so different but in fact so similar, sharing the same enthusiasm, you wonder whether there isn't a cement, a principle, a solution to all our problems."

So much for the power of football. But the game itself showed in this World Cup that it also has on-field problems seeking solutions. The decision by the game's ruling body, FIFA, that referees should use red cards to protect attacking players from scything tackles was laudable. Unfortunately, many of today's footballers could have made their careers on the stage. There were shameless theatrics from players clutching their heads as though shot, or rolling on the grass in imitation agony. A plethora of red cards and penalties ensued, some of which may have changed the direction of the tournament. French defender Laurent Blanc was suspended from the final, missing his place in history, partly because of the performance of Croatia's Slaven Bilic. The Croat reacted to a light tap as though he had been hit by Evander Holyfield. Bad decisions cost other countries dearly. Might England have won with 11 men on the field against Argentina? Yes, midfielder David Beckham certainly deserved admonishment for his petulance, but a referee with more sense of the game would have shown latitude by raising the yellow rather than the carton rouge. As it was, he ruined a fluid game. No less than Pele, who as a player lacked the protection from referees he deserved, called the refereeing "the low point of this World Cup."

But bad taste in the mouth left by bad decisions was fast-fading on Sunday night. What will remain is the image of Chirac, draped in a French scarf, kissing the victorious players as the triumphal theme of Star Wars competed with fans singing the Marseillaise in the Stade de France.

On Copacabana Beach in Rio de Janeiro, the night was cold and rainy. Only a few thousand bedraggled Brazilians gathered around the giant television screen, accepting their defeat glumly. The coach of their beloved team, Mario Zagallo, admitted, "France had the entire nation behind it. That was something we couldn't overcome." That's the beauty of the World Cup: sometimes David can beat Goliath.

--With Reporting by Bill Saporito