When Just Fontaine scored, an image for eternity

There was one whose name was Just Fontaine and out of the thirty-two thousand plus days of his long life, twenty were enough for him to gain eternity. From 8 to 28 June 1958 during the World Cup in Sweden he scored 13 goals, standing as the best scorer ever in the history of the World Cup. As a reward they gave him a carbine, he politely refused: he said he loved fishing, the wait it entails, probably the hypothesis of a failure within reach of the hook.

Confirming that we are all the revelation of a plot, fate cut his figure into a melting pot of ethnic groups: he was born in Marrakech, Morocco, of a French father and a Spanish mother, he played for France, married a girl from Treviso, lived dreaming of Frank Sinatra’s America – he had a beautiful voice that led him to perform in nightclubs – they called him the Chinese, because of the narrow eyes, similar to slots in the mailbox. In the photos that circulate during his farewell hour, Fontaine is kicking at the net, his young hair slightly unkempt by the wind, a flutter of a halo fixes him forever inside a small time, in that vague universe we call memory.