For those amongst us of a certain age, the scenes from the streets of Warsaw yesterday afternoon
and evening had a wearyingly familiar look to them streets of mostly young men, mostly wearing
terrible clothes, trading kicks and punches on the street of a European city whilst others,
including, of course, a media that had over the last few days given every impression of really
looking forward to this moment, looked on.
International teams from across Europe have battled for supremacy to become European Champions
since 1960 when France hosted the inaugural championships that were won by the Soviet Union with
Yashin, Ivanov & Bubukin out muscling their Yugoslav counterparts. 52 years and 13 finals later,
Poland & Ukraine host the championships with Spain arriving as both [.
By the early 1990s Scotland had qualified for five consecutive World Cups.
No matter how meagre the feast when we got there, we were remarkably adept at scavenging
invitations to dine at football's top table.
Yet this success was not replicated in the European Championships.
As with the World Cup we didn't actually bother with the tournament at first, sitting out
qualification in 1960 and 1964, possibly in protest at 'UEFA European Nations Cup' lacking a
certain oomph as a name.
Costa Rica:
Costa Rica name rings a lot of sweet memories to me in football. One of my nicest memories of the
game was attending 1989 Youth World Cup that was hosted in my home, Saudi Arabia. I remember
attending one of the group stages games of Costa Rica vs. Columbia. And a the captain Ronald
Gnzalez scored the 1-0 winning goal at the last minute from a beautiful free kick.
Costa Rica:
Costa Rica name rings a lot of sweet memories to me in football. One of my nicest memories of the
game was attending 1989 Youth World Cup that was hosted in my home, Saudi Arabia. I remember
attending one of the group stages games of Costa Rica vs. Columbia. And a the captain Ronald
Gnzalez scored the 1-0 winning goal at the last minute from a beautiful free kick.
In the latest New Statesman there's an interesting article by Gary Younge on his relationship with
the England team. In it he notes that, in the international arena, Scotland have "found a way to
enter into the spirit of being lovable fuck ups." It's easy to recognise what he's talking about,
the sing and drink at all costs mentality that I'm not entirely comfortable with and which found
its
It's almost a quarter of a century since the Republic of Ireland made their debut in
international tournament football, when a first round exit in the European Championships was
ameliorated somewhat by the pleasure of beating England in the group stages. Since then Ireland
have reached the quarter-finals of the World Cup finals twice, but 1988 has proved to be the
country's sole appearance in the finals of the European Championships until this time around.
From perennial under-achievers to perpetual favourites in considerably less than ten years, the
first decade of the twenty-first century was the one that transformed the world's perception of the
Spanish national football team. Spain began the new century living very much down to people's
expectations, with a quarter-final defeat at the 2000 European Championships being followed up with
a quarter-final defeat in the World Cup two years later and a first round elimination at Euro
2004.
MOSCOW, Russia- Former Soviet international goalkeeper , who later turned to television
commentating, died on Sunday after suffering a stroke last week. He was 74. He died on the last day
of the Russian Premier League season and most teams held a minute's silence in his memory. The
Ukraine-born Maslachenko made his name playing for [.
Two years is not a long time in football, especially when you consider that national sides
evolve, certainly more than club sides. In that respect, you would have expected quite a few
rematches from European Championship finals happening in subsequent World Cups. However, of the
twenty-six finalists in the first thirteen European Championships, six of them have failed to
qualify (including Czecholslovakia Denmark and Greece, who were European Championships), and three
others have failed to get out of the group stages.
Canada qualified for the World Cup finals once, in 1986. Never before, not since. To get there,
the Canucks beat Honduras a momentous day in Canadian soccer history but then lost all three of
their group games in Mexico that year. They didn't disgrace themselves, however, losing only 1-0 to
then-European Champions France (to a late Jean-Pierre Papin goal), 2-0 to Hungary and then 2-0 to
the Soviet Union.
When the World Cup was expanded to twenty-four nations for the tournament in Spain in 1982, the
decision didn't come without criticism. Some of it was reserved for the fact that twenty-four
nations meant that the tournament had to take an almost absurd looking shape with two group stages
(which was jettisoned after one tournament), but the majority of it was reserved for the notion
that an expanded World Cup finals would lead to lopsided matches, with new teams getting thrashed
out of sight by the old guard.
North Korea World Cup 2010 Preview #27 (Group G) is a post from: Just Football
North Korea
Appearances at World Cup finals: North Korea have qualified just once before,
at the 1966 tournament held in England. Since then they've withdrawn or not entered on four
occasions and have failed to quality on all other occasions.
New Zealand World Cup 2010 Preview #22 (Group F) is a post from: Just Football
New Zealand is a island-country in the Pacific Ocean with a population of just 4 million. For a
country of 4 million that has hardly embraced the game of football to qualify for 2 World Cups is
quite astonishing.
I think it might be a good idea to look at previous World Cups and find out how the hosts fared in
their opening matches. Here's the full list, with the hosts listed first: 1930: Uruguay 1-0 Peru
1934: Italy 7-1 USA 1938: France 3-1 Belgium 1950: Brazil 4-0 Mexico 1954: Switzerland 2-1 Italy
1958: Sweden 3-0 Mexico 1962: Chile 3-1 Switzerland 1966: England 0-0 Uruguay 1970: Mexico 0-0
Soviet Union 1974: West Germany 1-0 Chile 1978: Argentina 2-1 Hungary 1982: Spain 1-1 Honduras
1986: Mexico 2-1 Belgium 1990: Italy 1-0 Austria 1994: USA 1-1 Switzerland 1998: France 3-0 South.
As Portugal gear up for only their fifth ever FIFA World Cup we begin to ponder once again if
they will ever mount a serious assault on football's grandest stage.
Over the past ten years the Selecção das Quinas have produced some of the finest talent in
Europe, most notably Cristiano Ronaldo, and Luis Figo before him.
OTP gives you the lowdown on all the Euro 2012 teams. 10 word description: Hosts hoping home
advantage will help overcome patchy recent form. Coach: Oleg Blokhin The former Dynamo Kiev and
Soviet Union striker is back for a second stint in charge of Ukraine. He enjoyed success between
2003 and 2007, albeit with a [.
International qualifiers might now lack the quality of top flight European football, but they
more than match the major leagues for drama and unpredictability. In the qualifiers for Euro 2012,
one feels that anything and everything could happen and probably will. For the likes of Italy and
France, things are going to get worse before they get better.
I would have imagined that Ronnie Whelan was watching the Euro 1988 final with his friends or
family and reflecting back on his great year, great Euro, and most important, his great goal that
would be undoubtedly win the memory of the world as 'goal of the tournament'.
Ronnie goal was against Soviet Union in the first round, and after Republic of Ireland defeated
England 1-0, they almost did the same with Soviet Union, but the game ended 1-1 tie.
Marco Van Basten will always remember his famous volley goal vs. Soviet Union, people will always
remember Zidane incredible volley in the Champion League final in 2002, and wayne Rooney today
scored the goal that he will be remembered with for the rest of his life.
Yet another objectively evil regime was hosting yet another Summer Olympics, and someone asked
Secretary of State Condoleeza Rice about a boycott. She spoke out strongly against it.
Quote: "I do not think the boycott of the '80 Olympics was very effective. In fact, I think it
looked feckless," she said.
There are plenty of people, not least within the governing bodies of football itself, who would
have it that football and politics don't mix. This is, of course, bunkum, whether we like it or
not. The game holds such influence over so many people that it sometimes seems impossible for
politicians not to be able to link the two, from the relatively harmless, "You only win the World
Cup under Labour" slogans of Harold Wilson's British government of the late 1960s to the altogether
more sinister machinations of the state organisations and their leaders that ran clubs in Eastern
Europe during the Cold War.
As we are approaching the QF of the U20 WC, and Nigeria is one of the qualified teams so far, it is
good time to remember one of the most incredible things ever happened in the world of the game.
That was in the 1989 U20 WC QF, Nigeria vs. Soviet Union. The game was held in Dammam in Saudi
Arabia, and I have attended the game in the stadium myself.
The first time Andreas Davi saw the movie "Miracle" a few years ago, he was
still learning English and didn't quite fully understand coach Herb Brooks'
infamous speech to the U.S. hockey team before their historic upset of the Soviet Union at the 1980
Winter Olympics.
We've watched WBA's striker Peter Odemwingie a few times this season, and he's looked a very good
player. Peter Odemwingie - top WBA striker The player, who stands just under 6′ tall, is of
Nigerian descent and was born in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, Soviet Union 29 yeas ago. He w as brought up
in Russia, although [.
Granted this is a bit of a non-story, but I've chosen to relay it for one good reason it
contains what is possibly the most bafflingly excellent metaphor in the history of the modern
game.
Legendary Russian striker Viktor Ponedelnik, a veteran of Soviet Union's single
European Championship triumph in 1960 (he scored the winning goal against Yugoslavia in the final),
has criticised former Russia manager Guus Hiddink for ruining the career of
Chelsea's first-choice auxiliary left-back Yuri Zhirkov.
