Google Oddities

Google is so strange. I got the following in my e-mail yesterday from the Sydney Herald, via Google Alerts:

Defender Lilian Thuram has announced his retirement from international soccer…”

Wow, I thought. That was unexpected. I thought for sure he’d make it through Euro ‘08. Then I finished the sentence. And the sentence after that. And on through a couple of paragraphs.

…after 103 appearances for France.

“I have decided to quit ‘Les Bleus’. I’m 32. I know I have already given France the best I could give,” Thuram, who is equal second in the country’s list for all-time caps, told sports daily L’Equipe yesterday.

“In two years time there will be another World Cup. Maybe some players will be performing better than me. It’s time they get ready. It’s the end of Thuram’s cycle,” the Juventus player added.

Buh..huh…WHAT?!? Thuram is 35! And plays for Barcelona! And has something like 134 caps!

I check the date. Hmm. July 28, 2004. A link in the same article says, “New boy Cisse helps Liverpool hammer Celtic.”

Right then. I have no explanation. I think it was the Google gremlins.

And so, for the record, Thuram is still playing, and Djibril Cisse is still at Marseille.

And so…well… As you were.