I am as certain as can be that most Americans know little about the French soccer team from Brest. In fact, most of we Yanks would find it impossible to point to Brest’s general vicinity on the French map. (It’s due west of Paris, not too far from Cherbourg, site of the Normandy hard water port that was so crucial to the Allied landings of 1944.)

Similarly, I am quite certain that few folks on this side of the Atlantic know much about Lorient, France, or about FC Lorient. (It’s on the south coast of Brittany.)

These two rather anonymous French clubs now find themselves engulfed in the big media fire currently sucking so much oxygen from the global soccer room right now.

These are the final two opponents for Paris Saint-Germain and the retiring icon David Beckham. Both matches carry their own significance as the French Ligue 1 season winds down – simultaneously bringing down the curtain once and for all on the performer who so deftly entwined athletic skill with celebrity status over three decades.