Ha he scored more goals than Stoichkov that season. Underrated player, true RM legend and a shame how he treated by them in the end.
1956/57 European Cup 1st Round Real Madrid - Rapid Wien 4:2 1:3 No away rule so there is a playoff-game which is played @ Bernabeu (Real wins 2:0 ) Why?
If you're asking why the playoff game, that was common practice during that time. PKs as tie breaker were not introduced until the late 1960s IIRC, and like you said there was no away goals rule. If you're asking why at the Bernabeu, I have no idea.
https://www.bigsoccer.com/forum/showpost.php?p=10472618&postcount=8 Meanwhile, Real Madrid had had a gruelling path to the semi final. In the first round, they had met a strong Rapid Vienna, with Ernst Happel anchoring defense and Gerhard Hanappi making his side’s play. The first went tolerably according to plan, at least for 89 minutes, as Karl Giezser scored the 2-4 in the last minute, which gave Rapid a good chance of at least tieing in the return leg. That return leg was attended by 60,000 people in Vienna’s Prater stadium, and these 60,000 arguably witnessed the finest day in Ernst Happel’s career as a professional. The center half scored some three times in the first half alone, once per penalty. Nobody would have bet a penny on the great Real at half-time. But then Santiago Bernabeu visited his players in the dressing room. “We are not on vacation here! I don’t know if you comprehend this, but you are wearing the logo of Real Madrid on your chests!” At least di Stéfano comprehended that. After 60 minutes he scored the 1-3, which was the final score of the game. Both teams had to engage in a third encounter. In this moment, board member Raimundo Saporta proved his worth for Real Madrid. He negotiated with the Rapid officials about the venue for the third game and managed to convince the Austrians that playing in Madrid would be the best option for both since the big Bernabeu stadium would shower a lot of money on both clubs. On 12 December 1956, 100,000 people had paid their tickets to watch a game that Real won by two goals scored by Joseito and Kopa. In the quarterfinal, Real had less problems with French champions OGC Nice (6-2 on aggregate).
only thing i can make of that is rapid's officials mustnt have been to confident of progressing for them to agree to play the 3rd game in madrid. if you get past madrid on neutral territory then you get minimum another 2 games to bring in more revenue anyway and still be alive and competing for the trophy. looks like a take the money and run attitude
yep but you have to understand back in those prehistoric times they let the dinosaurs in for free and caveman were only charged half price
Passarella was a freak. He was 5'8'' but had an insane vertical leap. A friend of mine played soccer with him on Daniel's first professional team, Sarmiento and they would hang a ball up on a rope and pull it higher an higher until only Daniel could head it.
Jakub Blaszczykowski (now Borussia Dortmund) was taken by Wisla Krakow on trial only because of reccomendation of his uncle (Brzeczek - former polish national).
In season 1980-81, Fourth Division side Southend United created 17 club records at once: -They recorded 42 home points -30 wins including 19 at home -18 successive home wins -15 successive home wins from the start of the season -32 unbeaten home games -31 goals against -11 away wins -25 clean sheets including 17 at home (a fourth Division record at the time) -ten successive clean sheets -ten 'doubles' against other teams -six goals against at home (a fourth Division record at the time) -goalkeeper Mervyn Cawston completed 892 minutes without conceding a home goal between August and December 1980 -they were undefeated throughout the season at home -they had the fewest defeats in a season -no team completed the 'double' against them The players which achieved this record-breaking season were: Cawston (goal) Stead (right back) Yates (left back) Moody (center half) Cusack (center half) Hadley (midfield) Pountney (midfield) Mercer (midfield) Otulakowski (midfield) Gray (forward) Spence (forward) Info taken from Rothmans Football Yearbook 1981-82
Last Thursday, an almost-comeback from a 5-0 in Spain in a final. And a team being champion after a 6-1 defeat. The Copa RFEF is kind of a Europa League at national level: a tournament contested by teams playing in divisions low enough not to enter the Copa del Rey. Throw in homey refs (drawn from the same region as the home team) and Davis-Cup-style turfs at the liking of the home team. So the 2-legged final was held this last couple weeks with the results: 1st leg: Binissalem 5-0 Lemona http://www.eitb.com/es/videos/detal...federacion--el-binissalem-golea-al-lemona-50/ 2nd leg: Lemona 6-1 Binissalem. Binissalem wins the trophy on the away goal rule, after having held the 6-1 defeat for the last 15 minutes... http://www.eitb.com/es/videos/detalle/871070/video-lemonabinissalem-61--copa-federacion/
Great thread! Entertaining read, can't believe I only just found it. I'll add what I know off the top of my head about my own city and club... World's oldest surviving club: Sheffield FC (1857) - the post earlier about The Edinburgh Football Club of 1824 was a shock, anyone have a source on this? Second oldest club - Hallam FC (1860) of Sheffield, ergo oldest derby = Sheffield Derby, still contested today after 152 years Oldest ground still in use - Sandygate Road, Hallam FC (since 1860), in contrast to Sheffield who have almost always been nomads. Also been used for cricket for 2 centuries or more Oldest professional ground still in use - Bramall Lane (continuous since 1889)- been around since 1855, again originally for cricket and was home to FC and Wednesday before United since 1889. Also one of two grounds to host a full international, test match and FA Cup final First professional club named United - Sheffield United. But not, as often erroneously claimed, the first 'United', which was an amateur side in London. Named after Sheffield United Cricket Club who owned the ground Not much to list in the way of achievements for SUFC, though they did finish first or second in either league or cup for 6 straight years around the turn of the century, which I can't remember if it was actually a record but might have stood for some time. And for stories and anecdotes... United played on a three sided stadium to accomodate cricket, until the completion of a large grandstand in 1975. The previous season had been one of the closest ever in the English D1 - I forget exactly how many but around 5 or 6 teams could have won the league on the final day. Derby secured the title with 53 points, while United dropped all the way to 6th place on 49 points, one point shy of European football. However, the following season, with the huge new stand, they proceeded to finish bottom, and were relegated all the way to the fourth tier before returning 14 years later. After their next relegation from D1, the opposite stand was dismantled, and the replacement was missing for another 3 years (a result of an amazing tale of 3 crooked shareholders, two of which were done for fraud and corruption in other businesses, the third is still on the run to this day!). Adversaries called the ground the Bermuda Triangle - has three sides and everything in it mysteriously lost! Incidently the group that bought SUFC from the three wanted criminals included Charles Green who is now buying Rangers. Sold our strike partnership on the same day and ended up resigning after needing a police escort out of the ground. Good luck, chaps...
Transfers: After World Cup 1978, impressed with the new champions, our board sanctioned a scouting trip to Argentina. We cut a deal with Argentinos Juniors to buy Diego Maradona (quoted variously from £200k to £600k, bargained down from £1m), but the board held out given the cost of the new stand and our D2 status. Eventually withdrew and bought (current Argentina NT manager) Alex Sabella for £160k. Interestingly, we also bought Pedro Verde at the same time, uncle of Juan Sebastian Veron, who became a childhood fan, but never fulfilled his dream of playing for us . In the 80's we allegedly attempted to sign Jean Pierre Papin, while Wednesday rejected Eric Cantona on a trial. This was followed in the mid-90s by an audacious attempt to bring Paul Gascoigne to second tier football (Charles Green's ideas again). Also, we once signed the famous 'hardman' Vinnie Jones. Not so 'hard', apparently - he left less than a year later, after he was beaten up by his team mate, the striker Billy Whitehurst. Billy supposedly used to bare-knuckle fight gypsies for extra cash while he was at Oxford United. One of my favourites though: Glyn Hodges. I think we had him on loan from Palace at first in 1991, he scored or something, he was better technically than probably anyone else at the club. Anyway we were penniless, so the club organised a grand national sweepstake to raise the money (£450k i think?) all the fans chipped in and there was even a rumour that someone at the club remortgaged their house to make up the difference (not sure about that one myself). If only we had done that in 1978...
Oh and one more story: 1997 playoff final vs Palace at Wembley. Somehow a drunken fan had got hold of the mascots uniform and was wearing it outside the ground in jovial fashion. The club found out via Sky's prematch coverage but it was never recovered in time for the game, so they had to go without a mascot. Proved unlucky (or incompetant) as we lost in the last minute.
I originally heard this story "straight from the horse's mouth": Charlie Buchan was at the infamous 1-0 loss by England to the US in the '50 WC group match in Belo Horizonte covering the tournament and England (the NT) for the News Chronicle. At the end of the match there were only two phone lines available for Buchan and all the other reporters that were trying to "phone-in" their stories back to Fleet Street (actually they were being "phoned" to a cable office in Rio and then cabled on to London). By the time that Buchan could get his story "phoned-in" he found himself locked inside the stadium and had to climb over the gates to get out: http://www.charlesbuchansfootballmonthly.com/acatalog/History_the_Man.html As a personal aside: I did loads of freelance contributing to The News Chronicle when Mr. Buchan was still there and that's partly how I wound up as a de facto staff writer for the Football Monthly...
Very interesting thread indeed... Just to share one trivia here: As things stand, MLS 2012 could see 2 teams going through the entire regular season unbeaten at home: Houston and NYRB. It has only happened 3 times before: S.J. '05, RSL '10, L.A. '11...
Kick-Off (iPad Edition) chronicles the history of football and is packed with vintage images and videos of the beautiful game. It also has a lot of trivia which I'm sure people will be interested in. http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/kick-off/id520475324?mt=8.
[Arsenal didn't actually borrow their club kits from Forest: Forest sent their distinctive red playing kits to Arsenal as a charitable act because one of the Gunners had been a Forest player and he wrote a request to his old club for uniforms.]
Just read the whole thread, great idea, great bits of trivia, will try to add some today ... Vava scored a brace in the 1958 final and the last goal in the 1962 one, so he was the first player to do so ...
The craziest game of all time (Translated from the "Legends" hors-série by French magazine So Foot), sorry about the english mistakes. Bridgetown, Barbados, January 27, 1994. The national stadium is boiling. The Barbados National team has just scored a last minute goal that enables the "Bajan Rockets" to go to overtime, keeping the dream of qualifying from the preliminary round of the Shell Caribbean Cup, a qualifying competition for the Gold Cup, Concacaf continental national teams tournament. Between the pitch and the stands, the athletic tracks look immense. But despite the distance, the crazy laughs of the supporters can be clearly heard on the pitch by the Grenadian players, Barbados opponents on the day. Indeed, by scoring this goal on the 87th minute, Barbados probably played the biggest prank ever allowed by the rules of an official soccer tournament: the Barbados players indeed just scored the decisive goal in their own goal, and on purpose, to the disbelief of their opponents. So how was this mockery of football made possible ? For the fifth edition of the Shell Carribean Cup, the organisers decided to adopt an Ubuesque (surrealistic) point system: To prevent the ranking of the round robin from being too tight, decision was made that every draw would go to overtime with a golden goal to decide the winner ... and that Golden Goal would double count. At first sight not a terrible idea with every group consisting of only three teams playing each other once. Logically, before the last and decisive game, nothing is decided in Group 1 yet. Porto Rico beat Barbados 1-0, and Grenada beat Porto Rico with a golden goal in overtime after a goalless draw, making it a 2-0 victory. So at the start of the game, Grenada leads the group on goal difference, and qualifies with a draw or a one goal loss, while Barbados is last but can still qualify with a win by 2 goals. It’s a dream start for the Barbadians, who score early in the first half, then double the lead in the second half, and so are virtually qualified. But Grenada pushes, tries everything to score the goal that would earn them qualification, and they get their wish in the 83rd minute with a terrible own goal by a Barbadian defender. 2-1, Grenada is now in the driving seat, back on top of the group. Kick off, and the Barbadians now rush at the Grenadian goal, giving everything to restore their lead. This is their only chance to advance, at least that’s what they think for 4 minutes. Then, at the 87th, with the Grenadian defense seemingly in control, a crazy idea starts to grow in the mind of the Barbadian players. Little reminder of the rules: A draw here means overtime, and overtime means golden goal that double count. Question : with only three minutes to play, is it better to attack the opponent’s goal or benefit from silly rules to get more time in overtime ? The answer will come slowly, with successive backward passes which don’t trigger a Grenadian reaction with the Grenadian players well positioned to defend their goal. The Barbadians keep on going backward and soon they have the ball in their own six yards. Sealy, the centre back, and Horace Stoute the goalkeeper now pass each other the ball repeatedly, like they were leading … or like they were still shrinking from taking advantage of the absurdity of the rules and sitting on the very basic rules of fair-play. Suddenly, Sealy strikes a powerful shot in his own net, with Stoute looking at him. 2-2. The Bajan Rockets are now on the verge of overtime and can dream of the Golden Goal if they can hang on 2 more minutes without conceding a goal … and prevent the Grenadians from scoring an own goal themselves. Indeed, even though they were slow to understand, their opponents are now well aware of the trick and understand that they also can take advantage of the same rules by also scoring an own goal, a one goal loss sending them to the knock-out phase! What follow are the craziest two minutes in the history of football. Sealy, the Barbadian centre back quickly understands that the Grenadian are trying to do the same and saves the own goal with a goal line tackle. To avoid overtime, the Grenadian now try to score in either net, while the Barbadians try everything to defend both goals. James Clarkson, the Grenadian coach, after the game: “Our players were lost, they didn’t know which goal to attack, the Barbadian one or ours. I had never seen that in my life!” In front of a beaming audience, the crazy show goes on for four additional minutes, and no goal is scored. Overtime! The Barbadians have achieved the first part of their Machiavellian plan, they still have to achieve the second part: score the Golden Goal. They only have to wait 4 minutes, and at the 94th Trevor Thorne scores the decisive goal with an efficient shot. 4-2 final score. The Barbadians are through. Concacaf changed the rules the following year…
I discovered this many years ago and posted here before. That was the dumbest thing I ever did or posted in bigsoccer. I did not even tell to my friends in real life because only weirdo would figure this out. Okay, I discovered a strange pattern or coincidence on the surnames of the players on the English national team at the WC Finals. Surnames are different from given names. They are not trendy. For example, there were two Ashleys on the England team because it might be trendy to name baby boys "Ashley" 30 years ago. On the other hand, surnames are not trendy. Joe and Ashley Cole playing together are coincident. 1950: There were a Ditchburn, a Milburn and a Cockburn on the team. No other XXXburn ever went to the WC for England. “Burn” in a surname is very common, right? 1958: Hopkinson and Hodgkinson. There was a Hodge in 1990 and a Dickinson in 1950. No other “kinson” ever appeared in any WC team and “kinson” are very common. 1966: Hunt and Hunter. Fowler meant a hunter of bird. Otherwise, there was no other Hunt or Hunter in any other tournament. . 1970: Ball and Bell. There was Steve Bull in 1990. Okay, Ball and Bell were not confusing enough. 1982: Corrigan and Keegan…. No more XXXgan in any WC for England. 1986: In 1950, there were a Bentley and an Eckersley. For 36 years, no other ” XXXley” ever went to the WC Finals for England. Suddenly in 1986, we have Hateley, Bailey and Beardsley. And no other ‘ley” since. The team also had two Gary Stevens and one Trevor Steven, Waddle and Hoddle, and finally Bryan and Bobby Robson. 1990: Parker, Walker and Lineker. There were no other “ker’ in any other WC team 1998: Beckham and Sherringham. “Ham” is very common among English surnames, but Eastham on the 1966 team was the only other “ham”. Except Norman in 1958 and 1962, Seaman and McManaman were the only “man” ever went to the WC Finals for England. I do not count Les and Rio since they were cousins. 2002-2010: Of course, Joe and Ashley Cole…. Andy never went to a WC Finals. No other Cole in any WC team. 2006: Carrick, Carson and Carragher!! No other “car” in any WC Finals. Also, in 1962, we have Swan and Peacock. I know Woodcock in 1982 is a name of a bird. My English is not good enough to figure whether there were any other bird on the other teams.