Vincent Duluc recalls his 1994 World Cup across the United States | OneFootball

Writing in L'Équipe, Vincent Duluc recalls discovering America during the 1994 World Cup, a summer without France that turned from heartache into freedom to report. With scarcely a press conference and only two or three training sessions to attend, he criss-crossed the country, stacking up matches and stories, including Brazil’s run-out in Los Angeles on the eve of the final.

It was his last World Cup for Le Progrès before moving to L'Équipe, a trip open to every angle for a general daily. A snapshot by the fencing at the Los Angeles Coliseum, then under renovation, carried its own tale, and before departing he rang Pierre Quinon, the 1984 Olympic pole vault champion, for memories of the Games and the city.

He remembers 14 July in the gardens of Beverly Hills City Hall, where Michel Platini came to present the 1998 World Cup in France.

There was the whim to drive all of Sunset Boulevard and learn it took two hours. His Tandy computer’s liquid crystals slumped to the bottom of the screen in 40°C heat at the Rose Bowl final.

He recalls the Bulgarians sipping a beer by their pool in Princeton the day after their quarter-final win over Germany, and the old Chicago boxing gym where Cassius Clay first fought.

He spotted Eric Cantona and Didier Roustan in the press box for France Télévision, and left with a wish to live another World Cup in America. Perhaps not that America, but certainly that journey.

Source: L'Équipe