We don't understand the third-place matches in sports tournaments. One exception is the Olympics, when you kinda need one to determine the bronze medal. (Although, why not award it to both?) In other competitions, it makes no sense.

Could you imagine if, in the NFL, the AFC and NFC championship losers played each other in the third-place game? We'll, we missed out on the Super Bowl, but we're number three! We're number three! Yeah, not exactly.

So it makes a lot of sense that a lot of tournaments have removed the third-place match. (In America as well; did you know that the NCAA Final Four had one until 1981?) The European soccer championship, for instance, abolished it back in 1984.

Yet, in the World Cup, it continues, for whatever reason. (We guess they award medals too?) Which is a very long way to get to the point: back in 1986, the French team that finished third in the World Cup featured a Jewish defender, Algeria-born William Ayache. This makes Ayache only the second Jew to win a World Cup medal, joining Hungary's second-place Ferenc Sas in 1938.

Ayache played for France in the Olympics as well, winning the gold in 1984.

Now that we understand!