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There doesn’t seem to be a thread on association football/soccer, but the business end of the current European season seems like a good time to start one.

 

Feel free to post anything that’s soccer-related: current stuff, old stuff, YouTube clips, outstanding examples of football-related architecture, adolescent memories of Championship Manager and Gazzetta Football Italia, underrated commentators (there’ll be some appreciation for Peter Brackley, hopefully), retro football kits, your first soccer-related video game, any favourite goals etc. It’s completely up to you!

 

I’m admittedly a bit of a lapsed fan, but this could be fun.

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5 minutes ago, Moonman said:

 

Even my QPR-supporting friend loved that game. Managing to avoid relegation that day helped, of course. 😉

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Shouldn't the score at the end have read 4-2 instead of 3-2? After Manchester City scored a goal in that clip, it looked to me that the ball went back over the line and an opposing player kicked the ball back in, again, in their team's own goal. So, shouldn't that have been another point for Manchester City?

 

My favorite clips are of goals like these:

 

Spoiler

 

 

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14 minutes ago, Moonman said:

 

@InquisitivePhilosopher Well they have to kick off before another goal can be scored :D If you like those goals look up the one Ronaldo scored last season against Juventus. 🙌

 

Oh, okay. I guess I'm used to hockey being scored like that, sometimes, when there have been plays like that, where another point went to the team that just scored because an opposing player or goalie accidently hit the puck (or if it went off of their skate) back into their own team's net.

 

It's this clip, correct? Yeah, I liked that goal, too. I remember seeing it, last year (immediately after the game), when it went viral. It's also included in the "Best 20 Bicycle Kicks" video I posted.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nt8198a0acA

 

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Don’t you mean football? Y’know like the rest of the world calls it :P 

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55 minutes ago, InquisitivePhilosopher said:

Shouldn't the score at the end have read 4-2 instead of 3-2? After Manchester City scored a goal in that clip, it looked to me that the ball went back over the line and an opposing player kicked the ball back in, again, in their team's own goal. So, shouldn't that have been another point for Manchester City?

 

My favorite clips are of goals like these:

 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

 

Yes! I also love bicycle and overhead kicks. Gianluca Vialli is the master of them, surely? After all, he scored at least *four* magnificent bicycle/overhead kicks during the 1994/95 season alone.

 

Spoiler

 

 

 

 

 

Other bicycle/overhead kicks that I love include:

 

Roger Boli's overhead kick for Walsall against Southend United is *brilliant*. "Roger Boli, three seasons ago, was top scorer in French football, proving that the loss of Kyle Lightbourne may not be as burdensome as some thought."

 

Spoiler

 

 

Fun fact: Trevor Sinclair's overhead kick for QPR against Barnsley won the Goal Of The Season award on Match Of The Day.

 

Spoiler

 

 

Michele Di Piedi's overhead kick for Sheffield Wednesday against Sunderland is also worth mentioning.

 

Spoiler

 

 

You can even find them in pre-season friendlies! Michael Owen's goal for Liverpool against Benfica is terrific.

 

Spoiler

 

 

And, finally, here are a few other examples from Serie A, circa 1994/95 and 1995/96: Ciro Ferrara for Juventus against Piacenza, Marco Branca for Parma against Inter, and Igor Protti for Bari against Fiorentina.

 

Spoiler

 

 

 

 

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1 hour ago, Lichley said:

Don’t you mean football? Y’know like the rest of the world calls it :P 

Ha, of course! But it was either a case of calling it soccer and opening myself to ridicule, or risk getting a bunch of replies on Australian rules football and the NFL. I know which one I'd prefer. 😉

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2 hours ago, InquisitivePhilosopher said:

Shouldn't the score at the end have read 4-2 instead of 3-2? After Manchester City scored a goal in that clip, it looked to me that the ball went back over the line and an opposing player kicked the ball back in, again, in their team's own goal. So, shouldn't that have been another point for Manchester City?

 

My favorite clips are of goals like these:

 

  Reveal hidden contents

 

 

Wait, there's more! Benito Carbone's goal for Sheffield Wednesday against Newcastle United is even better than Boli's overhead kick, which is saying something. If you only watch one of these clips, make sure that it's this one.

 

Spoiler

 

 

John Barnes' overhead kick for Liverpool against Blackburn Rovers is an absolute peach of a goal, too.

 

Spoiler

 

 

I promise that I'll stop now.

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My beloved Crystal Palace somehow won at the Emirates today and we're safe for another year, still can't quite believe it's all going quite this well! Now if we can hold onto Zaha and Wan-Bissaka and next season might be even better 😄🔴🔵🦅

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On 4/20/2019 at 9:19 PM, Moonman said:

This Premier League title race is the gift that keeps on giving. I'm pretty sure the team at the top of the league is going to change once or twice on the final day too. 

I know! The consensus on this morning’s Sportsweek was that Liverpool are the favourites, despite their Champions League commitments, but it’s so hard to guess what’s going to happen for the time being (well, at least until after the Manchester derby).

 

I spotted this on the One Touch Football forum, but I also love how the Romanian third division’s fifth regional league is shaping up: six games left, only one promotion spot and just one goal separating the top two sides.
 

wa63ac.png

 

3 hours ago, JamieF1 said:

My beloved Crystal Palace somehow won at the Emirates today and we're safe for another year, still can't quite believe it's all going quite this well! Now if we can hold onto Zaha and Wan-Bissaka and next season might be even better 😄🔴🔵🦅

Hooray! It’s nice to see them and Hodgson doing well.

 

And, don’t worry, I forgave Palace for what happened at the end of the 2009/10 season a long time ago! Relegation that day would've been cruel on Palace, anyway.

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59 minutes ago, antheap said:

Hooray! It’s nice to see them and Hodgson doing well.

 

And, don’t worry, I forgave Palace for what happened at the end of the 2009/10 season a long time ago! Relegation that day would've been cruel on Palace, anyway.

Oh wow, are you a Wednesday fan? I was at Hillsborough that day, still don't think I've been that nervous during any game since! Glad to see you've bounced back a bit since then, what a goal Forestieri scored the other day! 

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22 hours ago, Moonman said:

I've only been following through Match of the Day and it feels like he has because he's quality, but has Batshuayi made a difference to your season?

He's scored a couple of important goals and you can tell he's a quality player, but the problem is that he's offside a lot and doesn't contribute too much to the build up and stuff. Still a fantastic player but I think I prefer a fully fit and firing Benteke, although that's a rarity these days! 

 

Batshuayi has definitely made a difference to our season though as he's definitely help us pick up some points which I don't think we would have got without him.

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On 4/21/2019 at 11:19 PM, JamieF1 said:

Oh wow, are you a Wednesday fan?

Well, this is going to be a convoluted and long-winded answer! I’m sorry for the tardy reply, too!

 

I do support Wednesday, although I don’t follow them anywhere near as closely as I used to. But, given that I had attended quite a few local(ish) away grounds, such as the City Ground and Oakwell, by the time I had reached my mid-20s, I used to be a really keen supporter. And, even when I wasn’t allowed to attend home and away matches as a teenager, I was still enough of a Wednesday fan to keep tabs on how Pavel Srníček (RIP) was doing at Brescia. Back then, I was pretty content with spending pocket money on football books and magazines, rather than match tickets, so my relationship with football has always been slightly unconventional.

 

I eventually burnt myself out, though, and my affection for the game cooled: Euro 2016 actually became my cut-off point because it was such an unnecessarily bloated tournament. Nick Hornby wrote in Fever Pitch that fans sometimes start to drift away from football, occasionally out of nowhere, when they reach their late 20s, and I can definitely relate to that. And, now that I’m in my early 30s, I've actually found that the game itself has become a bit overfamiliar.

 

The sheer abundance of information also makes it difficult to keep reasonably abreast of what's happening – it’s no longer possible to browse through the BBC Sport website or casually read FourFourTwo without feeling disengaged and overwhelmed – and it increasingly seems like a game for only the most ardent fans. Plus, as Simon Kuper once explained, the relentless hype and hysteria that surrounds football (from both the fans and the media) eventually becomes exhausting. There really does seem to be few grey areas and little nuance at present: everything has to be either amazing or objectionable, and I do think that the game can lack warmth and be uninviting when the "football is all about opinions" mantra goes into overdrive.

 

The growingly performative nature of football fandom - don't even get me started on fan zones and ultra culture - also irritates me greatly, while Wednesday's fanbase has gradually become divided and po-faced over the past decade (particularly since Dejphon Chansiri's takeover). The mood around the club has been actively unpleasant at various points and, while Chansiri's ownership hasn't descended to the levels of farce that is often associated with Roland Duchâtelet or Venky's, it has generally been regarded as a PR disaster from pretty much the offset.

 

Hillsborough has often had an air of potential unfriendliness - you saw it first-hand when Palace avoided relegation - but I've not been able to identify with the fanbase for a long time, and I never liked the genuine belief from some fans that they were supporting a really big club. (In my mind, Wednesday are traditionally a yo-yo club of medium stature, much like Derby or Middlesbrough, and they probably weren't even a mini Everton or Spurs when Trevor Francis signed Andy Sinton and Des Walker after reaching the two cup finals in 1993. The required infrastructure to be invariably competitive at that sort of level just wasn't there, hence our subsequent financial problems.)

 

However, I can't bring myself to completely disassociate myself from the game because, to certain friends, I represent Wednesday and they still talk to me about football (despite what I’ve written, I'm happy to converse with them because I don't want to make a fuss out of my lapsed fandom). It's not always possible to shake off such an image and, while I still look out for Wednesday’s results, I'm perfectly fine with just listening to Sportsweek and the odd match commentary on 5 Live, as well as reading When Saturday Comes' newsletter and the occasional book on football history. (I recently enjoyed reading Scott Murray's The Title: The Story Of The First Division, for instance, and I keep meaning to buy Ian Plenderleith's The Quiet Fan.)

 

I've become a nominal supporter, of course, but it does make for a welcome change of pace.

 

On 4/21/2019 at 11:19 PM, JamieF1 said:

I was at Hillsborough that day, still don't think I've been that nervous during any game since! Glad to see you've bounced back a bit since then, what a goal Forestieri scored the other day! 

But, on a more positive note, I have vivid memories of that match, including the build-up: I definitely remember saying to a friend on the bus journey there that Palace would end up getting the result they needed. It still amuses me that I texted something like “Leon Clarke is a legend” to another mate at half-time, without knowing Clarke had sabotaged any chances of survival by kicking an advertising hoarding and thus dislocating his toe.

 

I also remember the relief when Marek Čech of West Brom scored that equaliser against Palace. And those final five or ten minutes, when Darren Purse scored and Stern John then hit the post, were unbelievably tense. No Jimmy Glass-type heroics from Lee Grant, though, alas.

 

The season that followed relegation was also, erm, interesting: we finished 15th, nearly went into administration, got hammered 5-1 at Exeter City, lost 4-0 at Leyton Orient and drew 2-2 at home to nine-man Yeovil Town. Oh, and a group of supporters hounded interim chairman and club legend Howard Wilkinson under the South Stand at the height of our financial problems which, in all honesty, was even more embarrassing than the time we drew 0-0 at home to Rushden & Diamonds in the 2003/04 season.

 

Forestieri's goal against Norwich was pretty good, though, and one of my first thoughts was its resemblance to Benito Carbone’s effort when we lost 7-2 at Blackburn in the 1997/98 season! And thanks for your good wishes; hopefully, we can finish in the top six next season!

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3 hours ago, Moonman said:

Very nearly put a three-way acca on this morning with Chelsea, Man United and Arsenal all to win. Glad I didn't after that shambolic United performance. Dropping points to Huddersfield, it's like they hit a new low every week at the minute! I'm starting to feel sorry for their supporters.

Haha! Well, I guess that Manchester United supporters can at least console themselves with the fact that they don’t follow Bolton Wanderers or Notts County!

 

Actually, I remember the managerial merry-go-round at Notts County almost a decade ago when they were in the same division as my team – the time when Martin Allen posted an appeal for lodgings on County’s website was a particular highlight - so goodness knows how badly they are being run now. I used to live in Nottingham as a young adult - I resultantly have a soft spot for both Nottingham clubs – and it’s a shame to see them drop out of the Football League. Meadow Lane is a lovely ground, too!

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I tried to get a football thread going a while ago, but it didn't really take off... so let's give it another shot!

 

I'm angry at my team (Hansa Rostock, Germany, 3rd level) because we could have been promoted easily, but we squandered too many points against teams from the bottom of the table. (This would usually be followed by a poor start to the next season, sacking the coach in November or so, declaring the rest of the season a "transition year" and repeat. We have been "transitioning" for seven years now).

 

However I grew to like a number of teams over the years, mostly after visiting them. Celtic FC are my 2nd team so to speak, have been for more than two decades ❤️ then a few others. When it comes to England, West Ham is where it's at. Or where it used to be at. So glad I got to visit Upton Park before they fucked everything right up. Been to Palace twice, but that was eons ago...

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4 hours ago, Homer said:

I tried to get a football thread going a while ago, but it didn't really take off... so let's give it another shot!

 

I'm angry at my team (Hansa Rostock, Germany, 3rd level) because we could have been promoted easily, but we squandered too many points against teams from the bottom of the table. (This would usually be followed by a poor start to the next season, sacking the coach in November or so, declaring the rest of the season a "transition year" and repeat. We have been "transitioning" for seven years now).

 

However I grew to like a number of teams over the years, mostly after visiting them. Celtic FC are my 2nd team so to speak, have been for more than two decades ❤️ then a few others. When it comes to England, West Ham is where it's at. Or where it used to be at. So glad I got to visit Upton Park before they fucked everything right up. Been to Palace twice, but that was eons ago...

Ooh, Hansa Rostock, that name rings a bell! I find the European lower leagues unusually fascinating, perhaps because of their general unpredictability and novelty appeal (I’ve previously mentioned how much I love the current state of the Romanian third division’s fifth regional league).

 

As a teenager, I used to love looking at the English non-league tables on Ceefax, and I was also interested in the smaller Serie A clubs (the likes of Bari and Reggina, although Roma were always my absolute favourites and used to be my unofficial second team), so I’ve always been an oddball supporter. As you can imagine, I’ve fallen out of love with the Premier League and, to a lesser extent, the Championship in recent years (I struggle to deal with the relentless hype and hysteria – I just want football to be a fun and relaxing distraction from life).

 

I’m quite fond of the Bundesliga, though: one of the British free-to-air TV channels used to show a lovely little highlights show on Saturday mornings, but they cancelled it a few years ago and it’s become a lot harder to casually follow it. I actually used to own a few German football shirts - Bayern Munich, Kaiserslautern and Karlsruher (I owned the latter two because they played Sheffield Wednesday in the UEFA Cup and Intertoto Cup, respectively) - so I’d definitely love to learn more about German football in general. That kind of thing genuinely does interest me, but I don’t really know where to start. (PS: I love The Simpsons, too, hence the thread title!)

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7 hours ago, antheap said:

Ooh, Hansa Rostock, that name rings a bell! I find the European lower leagues unusually fascinating, perhaps because of their general unpredictability and novelty appeal (I’ve previously mentioned how much I love the current state of the Romanian third division’s fifth regional league).

Yeah, we were the ones with all the Swedes in the squad :D we had six of them in our team at one point.

 

I don't really follow Bundesliga anymore. It gets pretty boring when the only question is if Bayern will win the title with a five point or a 16 point margin...

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Sweet to see that the open -topped bus that was taking Norwich City players through the town to celebrate their promotion to the Premiership broke down on route!

Love Jurgen Klopp's comment regarding tomorrow night's clash with Barca - minus the injured Salah and Firmino- ' If we fail, we will do it beautifully.' FOr me,though, (born and brought up in Liverpool), the Premiership is more important ,and I suppose I'll find out later this evening if that dream's still on. If Leicester draw or beat City....

 

 

 

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94 points and not having had the title in the bag for weeks is ridiculous on its own.

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14 hours ago, Homer said:

Yeah, we were the ones with all the Swedes in the squad :D we had six of them in our team at one point.

 

I don't really follow Bundesliga anymore. It gets pretty boring when the only question is if Bayern will win the title with a five point or a 16 point margin...

Yes, I remember Andreas Jakobsson and Peter Wibrån from Championship Manager! Timo Lange and Martin Pieckenhagen also sound vaguely familiar. I completely forgot that they signed Marcus Allbäck from Aston Villa, too, and I never knew that Jari Litmanen used to play for them!

 

But, yes, I know what you mean. When ITV used to show Bundesliga highlights, I was more interested in the smaller teams, particularly Augsburg (Koo Ja-cheol always stood out as a hidden gem) and Hertha Berlin (simply because they play in blue and white stripes), but also Darmstadt, Frankfurt, Freiburg and Ingolstadt. I’ve always liked Bayern Munich and I still have a soft spot for them – along with Roma, they were my Champions League team as a teenager and young adult (I especially loved Oliver Kahn – he was such a great player) – but they had admittedly become a little overfamiliar by then.

 

4 hours ago, Moonman said:

@antheap Bundesliga is relatively easy to follow if you have BT TV. They have a on-demand player thingy on there and they upload full games, highlights and those "magazine" programmes they produce. They have Serie A and Ligue 1 games on there from time to time too.

Thanks for your help - it comes much appreciated! I don't have a BT or Sky Sports subscription, alas. What I have found, however, is an official YouTube channel that's run by the German Football Association, which includes highlights/live streams of cup games and third division matches. It seems like a good temporary solution until I explore my options.

 

It's a shame that BT don't offer any day passes, actually, because that would be the ideal solution for someone who would like to tentatively dip back into a highlights show and the occasional televised game. (Being open about this seems a little awkward, but mental health problems, unfortunately, have dampened my enthusiasm and I don't feel ready to properly get back into football again, if you catch my drift. This is hard and, well, I'm struggling with life in general. Apologies for going off-topic a little.)

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1. Is Liverpool's victory against Barcelona the greatest comeback since Tranmere Rovers beat Southampton 4-3 in the 2000/01 FA Cup after trailing 3-0 at half-time? :P

 

2. Norman Smurthwaite's departure from Port Vale has reminded me of his insane Wikipedia entry. Still, not quite as unhinged as former Chester City chairman-cum-manager Terry Smith and his infamous three captains policy. And this photo of Denis Irwin is still the best football-related thing on Wikipedia.

 

3. This club statement from Bury chairman Steve Dale is also brilliant. I especially love his final sentence: "In advance of the scorn of the linguistics amongst you, if there are mistakes I apologise, getting the message over was more important." Just what is it with the basement division and cloudcuckoolander owners?

 

4. Roma's shirt game for next season is very strong. I'm particularly impressed that it resembles an Arsenal away kit from the mid-1990s.

 

2a92q8z.jpg

 

3 hours ago, Moonman said:

@antheap Yeah, I'm surprised they don't offer a way to watch it for non-subscribers. I don't have Sky but I can watch Game of Thrones through NOW TV and even buy a day pass if I want to catch something on Sky Sports. But the state of their commentary and the punditry on Sky isn't ever worth the £7.99 or whatever it is you have to pay for one game that will likely be on Match of the Day later anyway. Live football is by nature hit and miss.

 

  Reveal hidden contents

It's nothing to apologise for, I'm sorry to hear about your mental health problems and I hope things get better for you. The Tea and Sympathy section of the forum is always open and inviting if you ever feel like getting anything off your chest.

 

 

Thanks for the kind words - I genuinely appreciate it! :) I have good days and bad days - and, well, yesterday wasn't the greatest day. Pundits are probably my ultimate footballing pet peeve, so I'm definitely with you on that! ;)

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Aha! There is in fact an emoji...

 

Anybody else still reeling from the Champions' League semifinals this week? I don't think my heart rate is back down to normal yet!

 

It's going to be great to see the two big European cups contested by English sides - the only problem is now who to support? (I'm a Peterborough United fan, so no divided loyalties there :P)

 

Also, anybody else really rooting for the Blades next season?

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@Moonman League 1. Got off to a flying start, somehow managed to be scrapping for the playoffs at the end of the season despite having an awful run of form from about January XD lost out to Donny by a couple of points on the last day, which to be honest is preferable because the playoffs are too stressful and we didn't have the team for it anyway.

 

I'm actually not from Peterborough, I'm from near Sheffield :P (it's a long story) so obviously with Blades everywhere I've got to support a teeny bit, though I have to admit to falling for them a little bit. Chris Wilder is a gem and he's done wonders at the club (he came to my cricket club and accidentally broke a window). And they deserve it!

I want Norwich to do well, just no strong feelings...

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On 5/9/2019 at 11:35 PM, Moonman said:

I wish I was alive when the FA Cup meant more. The first season I remember watching as a fan was 2003/04, I was 8, that was the Arsenal's Invincibles season and even by that point the Premier League was starting to take over as the tournament English teams really wanted to win. My Dad always tells me how special FA Cup Final day was when he was a kid and I'm sad I haven't witnessed the magic.

I was studying for my A Levels during that season, so there’s a bit of an age gap between us, but my experience is surprisingly familiar! I got into football at the beginning of the 1999/2000 season, which was the fag end of the era when eight or nine Premier League games were generally played on Saturdays and about four of those matches were confined to a five-minute round up on Match Of The Day.

 

The first televised match that I watched in full was England’s Euro 2000 play-off qualifier against Scotland, but BBC One’s delayed coverage didn’t start until about ten minutes *after* the game had finished. Sky was showing practically every England friendly and qualifier at that point in time, so those sort of live games were rarely shown on free-to-air television until the 2001/02 season when the BBC bought the live rights to England’s home qualifiers for the first time.

 

I also grew up with the notion that the Football League play-offs were a very minor footnote of the football season, most likely because ITV’s weekly and networked highlights show was traditionally shown in a post-midnight slot on Mondays. Apart from local highlights on regional news programmes and regular Football Focus reports on First Division clubs, that side of things was completely marginalised until the Championship era began in 2004. My fondest memories from the 1999/2000 season, unsurprisingly, came courtesy of the Premier League, especially as the Bradford vs. Liverpool game on the last day simultaneously determined the final Champions League and relegation places.

 

Anyway, there was an awful lot of media discussion throughout that season about the FA Cup’s growing irrelevance (“the FA Cup Final is becoming tedious and it’s no longer the same” was the stock criticism). That was the season when Manchester United decided to withdraw from the FA Cup, of course, after the FA had asked them to compete in the inaugural FIFA Club World Cup, with the expectation that it would boost England’s chances of hosting the 2006 World Cup. But that ended up being a complete PR disaster: United performed quite badly – I remember the fuss that was made about David Beckham’s red card against Necaxa – and they named a second-string team, which included the likes of Quinton Fortune and Jonathan Greening, against South Melbourne. The FA also briefly experimented with scheduling third round ties for the middle of December, rather than the beginning of January, while ITV’s coverage of the FA Cup between 1997 and 2001 also kickstarted the perception that it was being devalued.

 

Sky had the first pick of live games, which meant that ITV only had rights to one second choice match from the third round onwards (a mid-table Championship side vs. Liverpool was a standard third round pick on ITV) and no replays or early round fixtures were ever shown live. Barry Venison was often ITV’s senior pundit on those games, too, even though he was arguably the yesteryear equivalent of someone like Kevin Kilbane in the punditry stakes. The BBC owned the secondary FA Cup rights, and thus you could watch extended highlights on Match Of The Day or short round ups on Football Focus, so I never felt the need to watch any live matches until the semi-final stage or, more often than not, the final itself.

 

ITV’s accent was firmly on live Champions League games and, to a footballing novice like myself, the FA Cup did seem a little antiquated and unsophisticated, particularly when compared to the BBC’s Euro 2000 coverage and Channel 4’s Serie A magazine Gazzetta Football Italia. That really shouldn’t have been the case, of course, but I was at an impressionable age and living with a family who hated the sport meant that I had to prioritise certain matches or programmes over others. It was always much easier to dip into one or two of the magazine shows and the Sunday morning repeat of Match Of The Day than a live Champions League or FA Cup match, for instance.

 

Still, even though I was pretty disengaged with the FA Cup as a 13-year-old, it’s interesting to note that I vividly remember quite a few moments from the 1999-2000 season. Benito Carbone’s fifth round goal for Aston Villa against Leeds, for instance, was probably the first goal that I truly loved (that game was shown live on ITV, but I saw it first on either Football Focus or Match Of The Day). My team, Sheffield Wednesday, lost 3-1 to Gillingham in the same round despite naming a full-strength side, which seemed more humiliating than losing 8-0 at Newcastle and finishing 19th in the Premier League that season. The semi-final between Aston Villa and Bolton (whose line-up included a fresh-faced Eidur Gudjohnsen) ended in penalties, following a 0-0 draw, but it seemed a lot more exciting than it presumably looked because it was the first proper live match that I had watched on TV.

 

And, while the FA Cup unfortunately seems rather subservient these days, at least the BBC now broadcasts a more diverse range of live games. I mean, even back in the late 1980s, West Ham vs. Arsenal and Newcastle vs. Manchester United were pretty much the type of live fixtures that the BBC picked for every televised round.
 

On 5/9/2019 at 11:35 PM, Moonman said:

We have two European finals with all-English teams, a first. Now if the national team can go and win the Nations League we'll have done a clean sweep :D 

Two all-English (or all-German or all-Spanish etc) finals is exactly the kind of footballing curiosity that I love! I actually don’t mind who wins – after all, having an irrational dislike of, say, Chelsea or Liverpool would be a complete waste of energy (having a soft spot for another club just seems nicer) - but I would like all four sets of travelling supporters to enjoy an even match. I’ve always been partial to Spurs, though, and I do love their current away kit, so I guess that it would be really nice to see them perform well on the night.

 

On 5/9/2019 at 11:35 PM, Moonman said:

Talking of comebacks though, the Liverpool victory had me in awe because they did that without Salah and Firmino, but that Tottenham victory had me questioning everything that I thought I knew about football. I just don't know anything anymore but it was unbelievable to watch. At 94 minutes I was sure it was over but they get the ball forward and the rest is history. What a remarkable match.

I also loved Liverpool’s comeback against AC Milan in 2005. I was revising for some exams at the time and had actually missed the entire first half, which seemed to make the rest of the match an even more dazed affair.

 

On 5/9/2019 at 11:38 PM, Moonman said:

@antheap Speaking of Roma, there's talks they could get bought out by a Qatari-backed group. It would be a shame if they sought to make Roma the PSG of Italy, but Juve being locked on to win it year after year surely isn't doing the league any good. Antonio Conte looks the favourite to take over at Inter too so maybe there's some hope for a genuine competition in Serie A next season.

I wasn’t aware of this but, yes, it’s definitely a double-edged sword, especially now that Aaron Ramsey is joining Juve!

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@antheap

That Ibrahimović long distance overhead kick was AWESOME :D

 

And here's something  by Marcin Mięciel.

The first two goals of the video (first when he was in Borussia M'bach and second for the national team) is what I'm talking about.

Spoiler

 

 

As for the European cups, I was hoping Ajax would come through. Not that I'm a fan of theirs specifically, but it's certainly more interesting that all- (insert league) final. Also, did you know that only once since 2000 has the CL trophy gone a team from outside the Big Four leagues (that's FC Porto under Mourinho)? Also, I think Ajax was, only the fifth team in SEMIfinal from outside the those four leagues since 2000 (that includes Porto).

 

And if we're talking about the Stambul final, let's not forget the Dudek dance :D 

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Some heartening news: Andy Brennan, who plays for second-tier club Green Gully, has become the first Australian footballer to come out as gay. His official statement is very eloquent and I'm really chuffed for him.

 

On 5/11/2019 at 10:52 PM, Moonman said:

Oh yeah, with both BT Sport and BBC broadcasting games you get a pretty good scope these days. You can catch as many as four live games a day and I think the kick-off times are scattered well. It was nice to watch Newport County vs. Leicester kick off at 5 and be televised after a good bunch of games were played earlier in the day. Wolves vs. Man United had a 7:45 kick-off so they space the games out and give you a chance to watch plenty. Yeah, it's been pretty good this season, Manchester United vs. Arsenal in the fourth round is one of the best games I've seen all season.

 

I had no idea the decline in importance started earlier though. Was it because it was always the same teams competing in the latter rounds?

The FA Cup was still a big deal among the core sporting community at that point in time – Darren Anderton’s goal for Portsmouth against Liverpool in the 1991/92 semi-final kickstarted his career, for instance - but the general profile of football was definitely at its nadir between 1983 and 1989. A number of unpleasant incidents had occurred prior to the Heysel Stadium disaster, including one FA Cup match between Leicester and Burton in January 1985 that had to be replayed behind closed doors because Burton’s goalkeeper was knocked unconscious by a plank of wood.

 

Football certainly wasn’t confined to hooligans or working class supporters in the 1980s – Nick Hornby’s Fever Pitch clearly demonstrates that - but its casual and crossover appeal was far less pronounced, and quite a few supporters had drifted away from the game (including Ian Broudie himself - seeing a dart on the back of one fan's head was his final straw, IIRC). Some of Aston Villa and Tottenham’s home matches were attended by fewer than 10,000 fans, for instance, and average top-flight attendances frequently dipped below the 20,000 mark, a figure that was only bolstered by Arsenal, Liverpool and Manchester United regularly posting attendance figures well in excess of 30,000.

 

There was arguably a more suppressed liking for football, largely because of the apathy and stigma that surrounded the game, plus English football itself was generally considered to be substandard. That attitude lessened considerably after Italia ’90, but the FA Cup Finals in 1990 and 1993 needed replaying, following respective 3-3 and 1-1 draws, and there was a lingering feeling that match-going fans would prefer a final result on the day (FA Cup Final replays were officially abolished in 1998).

 

And, by the mid-1990s, some media outlets were making some rather pointed comments on the state of the FA Cup: When Saturday Comes, for instance, described the 1995/96 quarter-final match between Leeds and Liverpool as “one of the most boring FA Cup ties ever played”. That season’s final was also widely regarded as an underwhelming affair, especially considering the pre-match hype that had come from both the Liverpool and Manchester United camps.

 

But, yes, the potential giant-killing matches were very rarely, if ever, shown live on free-to-air television until about two decades ago. Chelsea vs. Everton, for instance, was the BBC's live game in the round when Wrexham knocked out Arsenal during the 1991/92 season. West Ham vs. Arsenal was the BBC's live pick when Sutton beat Coventry during the 1988/89 season, while they also chose Bolton vs. Aston Villa over Kidderminster vs. West Ham during the 1993/94 season.

 

I don’t know why that was the case: ITV had signed a deal to show 21 live top-flight games per season between 1988 and 1992, so matches that involved the likes of Arsenal and Everton were already being shown on free-to-air television pretty regularly. Perhaps the FA and/or TV executives thought that Chelsea vs. Everton, rather than Wrexham vs. Arsenal, would encourage a more casual and passive audience to watch the FA Cup? Alternatively, it might have been the case that it wasn’t possible for a broadcaster to do a lengthy outside broadcast from some of the lower and non-league grounds in those technologically primitive days.

 

Stevenage vs. Newcastle in January 1998 is generally considered to be the first David vs. Goliath clash that was shown live on free-to-air television and, before then, relatively few teams that were ranked below the Championship play-off zone had been picked. Similar games, such as Macclesfield vs. West Ham in 2002 and Shrewsbury vs. Chelsea in 2003, were more commonly shown once the broadcast of more than one live FA Cup match per round became the norm on free-to-air television, i.e. from the 2001/02 season.
 

On 5/12/2019 at 9:05 AM, Piotrek said:

@antheap

That Ibrahimović long distance overhead kick was AWESOME :D

 

And here's something  by Marcin Mięciel.

The first two goals of the video (first when he was in Borussia M'bach and second for the national team) is what I'm talking about.

  Hide contents

 

 

As for the European cups, I was hoping Ajax would come through. Not that I'm a fan of theirs specifically, but it's certainly more interesting that all- (insert league) final. Also, did you know that only once since 2000 has the CL trophy gone a team from outside the Big Four leagues (that's FC Porto under Mourinho)? Also, I think Ajax was, only the fifth team in SEMIfinal from outside the those four leagues since 2000 (that includes Porto).

 

And if we're talking about the Stambul final, let's not forget the Dudek dance :D 

Welcome to the thread and, yes, that Ibrahimović goal was awesome! And thanks for sharing the Marcin Mięciel video: his first goal was my favourite, but some of his other efforts were also pretty good and he was clearly a talented player. I admittedly know very little about Polish football, so it would be great to hear more about it.

 

I completely get your point about the Champions League, too. An all-English or, say, all-Italian final has some curiosity and novelty value, but it would be great if the Champions League was a bit more openly competitive in general. I know that the same four or five countries have traditionally dominated it, but the occasional Monaco vs. Porto or even Bayer Leverkusen vs. Real Madrid-type final did make for a refreshing change.

 

Those are some great facts, too! Am I right in thinking that Dynamo Kiev from the 1998/99 season was the last eastern European side to reach the semi-final stage? It's slightly disappointing that Mike Newell, of all players, no longer holds the record for the fastest Champions League hat-trick, though.

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O.O 

Spoiler

 

 

Also, I distinctly remember a shot during the '94 World Cup after which a crossbar broke, but I can't remember which match, or even group it was in.

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On 5/16/2019 at 1:01 AM, antheap said:

I admittedly know very little about Polish football, so it would be great to hear more about it.

I've just found this montage of important goals in the history of the Polish national team, so enjoy. I can prvide some context for them, if you want.

Spoiler

 

 

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On 5/19/2019 at 8:16 AM, Piotrek said:

O.O 

  Hide contents

 

 

Also, I distinctly remember a shot during the '94 World Cup after which a crossbar broke, but I can't remember which match, or even group it was in.

Nice! A similar thing happened about a decade ago during a Championship match between Watford and Reading, actually.

 

Spoiler

 

 

I also love how former Wolves defender Neil Masters once managed to dislodge snow that had been resting on the crossbar.

 

Spoiler

 

 

On the subject of weather at football matches, I can’t help but mention Padova’s waterlogged pitch when they played Brescia during the 1994/95 season and, of course, 1997’s snowbound game between Tromsø and Chelsea.

 

Spoiler

 

 

 

On 5/20/2019 at 9:39 PM, Piotrek said:

I've just found this montage of important goals in the history of the Polish national team, so enjoy. I can prvide some context for them, if you want.

  Reveal hidden contents

 

 

Thanks for sharing those Polish goals, too; it was very kind of you to do so!

 

I was vaguely aware that Poland had a fairly strong footballing pedigree until the mid-1980s – I was given a reference book as a teenager that had loads of World Cup round-ups and European Cup Final results etc – but I never knew that they won gold at the 1972 Olympics. Olympic football has rarely been taken seriously in the UK but, considering that they also won silver medals in 1976 and 1992, how important is it in Poland? I noticed that the 1990s, and perhaps also the late 1980s, seemed to be a fallow period for the Polish national side. What went wrong, and how big a deal was Poland’s qualification for the 2002 World Cup and Euro 2008?

 

The inclusion of Marek Citko’s goal against England is particularly intriguing, though, given that Poland lost on the night. I wasn’t a big football fan in 1996 – I knew who Lee Sharpe was, for instance, but I hadn’t heard of Georgi Kinkladze or Fabrizio Ravanelli - so I’m curious about the general context of Citko’s goal. It doesn’t seem to be a landmark moment like Zbigniew Boniek’s World Cup hat-trick, obviously, but it clearly has a certain degree of significance. I’m sorry for asking quite a few questions, but I didn’t realise that the history of Polish football had such an interesting trajectory!

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Dang, everyone talking about the big games and here am I packing my stuff to go watch some amateur Dutch and German football :D

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