the face

I spent a good portion of the Ghana-Serbia match thinking about Milan Rajevac, Ghana's coach. When the camera showed him for the first time, the commentator informed us that he is Serbian, which was news to me. In the world of international soccer, it's not rare to see an imported coach suddenly playing against his own country, but what came up on the screen at that particular moment didn't seem like the face of a professional of the globalized game but that of a contrite, almost defeated man.
I don't know how many times they had the camera on him, but on every occasion he looked as if he were oblivious to the match. It seemed to me that he was repeating the same thing in his mind over and over again: "Imagine my luck, to have to play my first game of my first World Cup against Serbia... My luck, to have to play my first game of my first World Cup against Serbia... To have to play..."
I did think for a while that it was an act. World-class coaches know a lot about camera movement and being able to juggle conflicting interests is a key requirement of the job. But I couldn't shake off my first impression completely.
As soon as the referee blew the whistle to end the match, the camera went back to Rajevac. A Ghanian player and a member of the coaching team jumped to hug him, but he pushed them both odiously and walked away. It was reported that later on he talked about how well Serbia played and about Ghana's good luck in winning the match.