July 11 – The Tardelli Scream

WHAT would you do if you scored in a World Cup final? A cool shrug of the shoulders Cantona style? Raise one arm as you rush to the fans like Shearer? Or you would go mad and celebrate like you used to in the park with jumpers for goalposts?

Today in 1982 Italian Marco Tardelli revealed his inner-child as he scored the pivotal goal of the 1982 World Cup final against West Germany, with one of the greatest goal celebrations of all time.

Italy had come into the final on the back of Paulo Rossi’s footballing resurrection to meet a West German side who won their semi-final in controversial fashion meaning most neutral would be rooting for the Azzurri.

The never-say-die attitude of the West Germans, coupled with an injury crisis in the Italian defence that saw 18-year-old Giuseppe Bergomi marshal the back four meant that Italy had a tough task in front of 90,000 in the Bernabeu, who were hoping the fireworks of the two semi-finals would be repeated.

Antonio Cabrini missed a chance to put Italy ahead when he fired a first-half penalty wide as the two sides played out a goalless first half. Paolo Rossi was the man who again inspired the Italians when he scored just before the hour mark.

Ten minutes later one of the most iconic moment in World Cup history came when Tardelli picked up the ball just outside there area following a long passing move and slotted home.

Realizing that his goal had practically won the World Cup Tardelli set off sprinting to nowhere in particular, tears running down his face, and screaming the world ‘goal’. In what is known as the ‘Tardelli scream’ the midfielder would probably still be running now if no one was there to calm him down.

A couple of late goals took the final score to 3-1 and Italy had won their third title. Captain Dino Zoff made history, being the oldest player to ever pick up the trophy as Italian commentator Nando Martellini screamed “Campioni del mondo, Campioni del mondo, Campioni del mondo!”

It’s a good job that Tardelli got all that celebrating out of the system because his latest job is assistant manager of the Republic of Ireland, so we’re pretty sure that it’s going to be a while until he’s on the biggest stage again. See the pure, unadulterated joy of a man not afraid to show his emotions below and like a Portuguese come-and-get-me plea, we’ll be back tomorrow.

July 10 – Henri Delauney Still Gleaming

ON this football day in 2007….. On This Football Day.com was born! Yes dear reader it is one year to the day that we began our daily journey through the annals of football history for your pleasure. Does this mean the end of the line for the OTFD train I hear you cry? No no, fear not, just like Dean Windass’ career there is life in the old dog yet so do not depair, we will be here for the forseeable. Now, back to the football….

As football basks in the collective glory of the excellent Euro 2008 tournament we have all just enjoyed so much, we should all be getting down on our knees and doing the ‘we’re not worthy’ motion at the feet of the man who invented the competition and who the trophy is now named after.

That man is Henri Delauney who is sadly no longer with us, having passed away in 1955. A Frenchman, Delauney was a referee in his early days and along with compatriot Jules Rimet was instrumental in creating the World Cup. He was keen to set up a European competition but did not live to see his baby come to fruition.

Today in 1960, five years after Delauney’s death, the final of the first European Championships took place in France. Called the UEFA European Nations Cup it was quite different to the competition we know now. Seventeen teams entered the knock-out tournament but West Germany, England and Italy were not among them.

The first matches were held throughout 1958 and 1959 with the finals in France a much smaller event to what we are used to. Just four teams would contest the finals with home nation France facing Yugoslavia in one of the semis, with Czechoslovakia taking on the USSR in the other.

A thrilling 5-4 win put Yugoslavia in the final while the USSR cruised through with a 3-0 win over Czechoslovakia. Yugoslavia drew first blood in the final though Milan Galić but the USSR, captained by legendary ‘keeper Lev Yashin hit back with a Slava Metreveli goal. The stalemate could not be broken so the match went to extra time. Viktor Ponedelnik scored on 113 minutes to win the first ever European Championship for the USSR.

It was a somewhat fortunate victory for the Soviets as they were drawn against Spain in the quarter-finals but Franco refused to let his country’s team travel to Russia who had supported the Second Spanish Republic in the Spanish civil war. With no opposition the USSR team were given the victory.

See the goals from the final below and be sure to head back this way tomorrow when just like the credit crunch, we’ll still be here.

What was OTFD on about on this day last year? Find out here…

July 9 – ZZ Top

FOOTBALL’S unpredictability is one of the reasons we all love it so much. While there are some certainties in the beautiful game, like the reaction Robbie Savage gets at every ground in the country, or the fact that Sir Alex Ferguson still looks like a complete berk when celebrating despite twenty years of practice; the great thing about football is that no one knows what is going to happen.

The bookies have a good guess, pundits seem to predict what people want to hear and the papers will say anything if it helps them sell a few more copies, but no one actually knows.

The 2006 World Cup in Germany was a case in point. Although we could rely on that old certainty of England’s quarter final exit on penalties, few people expected Italy to reach the final as they came into the tournament just after the worst match-fixing scandal ever to hit the game.

But reach the final they did, and it was on this very day that they beat France to win their fourth World Cup. The match is of course remembered for far more than Italy’s win – France captain Zinedine Zidane saw to that. He had announced before the tournament that he would retire at the end of it, most thought his powers were fading fast, but he had a stormer of a World Cup and virtually dragged the French to the final, seemingly reinvigorated by one last challenge.

The stage was set for a a fairy tale end for Zizou: the World Cup final would be his last ever match before his retirement, and he had been playing out of his skin so far. Surely he would lead his team to victory.

Sure enough, an early penalty put away by Zidane seemed to suggest the match was following the Holywood script until Marco Materazzi scored for Italy to level the game. As the game wore on and went into extra time Zidane nearly won it but his header was tipped over by Buffon.

Then drama. Zidane suddenly turned, ran at Materazzi and headbutted him in the chest. Everyone was stunned and Zidane was sent off. As he left a football field for the last time ever he walked past the World Cup trophy that he had come so agonisingly close to winning. Instead, his last act in the professional game being sent off in the biggest match in the world.

Some British tabloids hired lip readers to try to ascertain what Materazzi had said to Zidane to provoke the response but after the Italian defender recently won legal proceedings against The Sun for their suggestions of what he said, we are steering well clear of that one.

In the penalty shootout that followed, France, without their captain and first choice spot kick taker, lost the shootout and the World Cup to Italy.

See the whole incident below and come back tomorrow when we will have another tale of footballing frolics from yesteryear.

July 8 – The Worst Foul Ever

WE don’t like to generalise here at OTFD, but German goalkeepers are a strange bunch. Jens Lehman and Oliver Kahn are two of the angriest footballers the game has seen in recent years, but for all their histrionics they couldn’t match the events of today in 1982, when Harald Schumacher committed the most famous foul of all-time when he flattened French defender Patrick Battiston.

The 1982 World Cup was reaching the business end of the tournament as West Germany took on France in the semi-final in Seville. Over in Barcelona Paulo Rossi was continuing his Lazarus-like comeback as Italy reached the final with a 2-0 win over Poland, but the other semi was where all the action was at.

In a real clash of styles, Michel Platini’s stylish French team faced a texbook efficient German side that had been stressing the importance of getting the result rather than entertaining in the run-up to the game.

The first half saw the sides trade a couple of goals and the game began to get more stretched after the interval. French substitute Patrick Battiston had been on the field ten minutes when he latched onto a long ball from Platini. Unfortunately for Battiston, Schumacher also had eyes for the ball and leap towards the Frenchman, slamming his body into Battiston who was smashed in the face by the hip of the keeper.

Battiston immediately fell to the ground, losing consciousness and his two front teeth, breaking his jaw and also suffered damaged vertebrae to boot. Teammates rushed to their fallen comrade, with Platini later admitting he thought he had died, as “he had no pulse and looked pale.”

Amazingly, the referee had not even give a foul, let alone a red card and Schumacher was hardly remorseful: “There is no compassion among professionals. Tell him I’ll pay for the crowns” was his reaction following the game. In one fell swoop, Schumacher had brought back the stereotypical image of an ugly, arrogant German, especially as he waved away the protests of the French players, looking annoyed that he couldn’t get his goal-kick taken quickly.

Battiston was given oxygen on the pitch and would later slip into a coma. He would eventually make a full recovery, and was a part of the 1984 European Championship winning side.

The game, meanwhile, continued, reaching extra-time after Manuel Amoros had crashed a 25-yard drive onto the German crossbar in the last minute. The extra-time period cemented this match’s place in the all-time great semi-finals as a further four goals were scored, meaning that penalties would be used for the first time in a World Cup semi.

And we all know what happens when Germany are in a penalty shoot-out. Schumacher would go on to be the hero, saving Maxime Bossis’ spot-kick and the Germans would meet Italy in the final.

See football’s most infamous foul below and come back tomorrow for something a bit less gory.

July 7 – Don’t Mention the Score

THE English like to think they have the monopoly on hating the Germans, but this really isn’t the case. When OTFD was spending a penny at a fan camp in Gelsenkirchen during the 2006 World Cup we had a surly Bavarian tell us that “we’re the same you and me – we love football, beer and women!” If you want a nation that really hate the German’s then head over to Holland.

Today in 1974 saw one of the most intense Holland-Germany clashes ever, when the two old enemies fought for the World Cup in Munich.

This was the first time that the two neighbours had met in a competitive game following the Second World War, with the swaggering total football purveyors lead by Johan Cruyff going in as heavy favourites.

Cruyff was in his pomp and was the undisputed best player in the world at the time, so it comes as no surprise that he was singled out by the German press in the run up to the game. German newspaper Bild ran a false story that went under the headline ‘Cruyff, Champagne and Naked Girls.’ The player was distraught following these allegations and it was even rumoured that this was one of the reasons he sat out the next tournament in Argentina.

The game couldn’t have started any better for the Dutch. Without the Germans even touching the ball, Holland won a penalty in the first minute which Johan Neeskens hammered home.

So far, so good. But then Holland did what can only be described as bottling it. A Paul Breitner penalty and then a Gerd Muller close range strike before half time put the Germans in front, where they would stay and a national complex was born.

It was “a perfect example of Dutch arrogance” said striker Johnny Rep. “We were so focused on humiliating the Germans… you should never think you can do that to them.” Midfielder Wim van Hanegem was even more emotional when he gave his verdict on what had gone wrong.

“I didn’t give a damn about the score. 1-0 was enough, as long as we could humiliate them. I don’t like them. It’s because of World War Two. They murdered 80% of my family. My father, my sister, two of my brothers. Each time I faced Germany I was angst-filled.”

The two sides have met several times since, with equally eventful outcomes. Their 1980 European Championship saw German an on-field punch up and we’ve already told you about their Italia ’90 clash. When Holland defeated West Germany en route to the Euro ’88 title, there was scenes of celebration not seen since 1945 across the country.

See footage from the final below and join us tomorrow for another tale featuring irritable Germans.

July 6 – England Lose the World Cup

HAVING failed to win a World Cup since 1966, today in 2000 England proved that they could not even win the contest to host the tournament. Not only that, but England’s bogey side Germany were again the nation to beat them, when they won the bid process.

It was on this day that England’s bid to host the 2006 competition came to a grinding halt when they were eliminated in the second round of voting at a meeting of the FIFA delegates in Zurich.

Word on the football streets was that England had reneged on a gentleman’s agreement with Germany that would see the Germans support England’s bid for Euro 96 if England would do the same for Germany’s 2006 World Cup bid.

England’s bid, launched in 1997, was based on the success of Euro 96 and the fact that there was nowhere in the world with better stadia and fans. World Cup winner Sir Bobby Charlton was roped in to head up the bid but there were warning signs as early as 1998 that the old hooliganism problem could scupper the whole thing, when some England fans rioted in Marseille during the World Cup.

Despite Tony Blair jumping on the bandwagon and throwing his weight behind the bid, England were struggling to woo the people with the power with Uefa and even two Scottish MPs coming out in support of the German bid. Further damage was caused when English fans rioted in Charleroi at Euro 2000 and things were looking bleak.

When the decision was announced World Cup winner George Cohen said: “I thought our presentation was absolutely superb. We have been called arrogant, but I cannot think of anyone less arrogant than Bobby Charlton.

“I just think it is a huge amount of politicking going on. Unfortunately we are not represented in Uefa or Fifa. We should be represented, we are a huge footballing nation. It is absurd.

“There may be a lot of anti-British bias. This is a humiliation for us, I think our bid was superb.

“Our campaign cost £10m but if we had won this it was worth hundreds of millions to us.”

Then sports minister Kate Hoey said the bid was doomed from the start. “There’s a problem if you start off the bidding process and you haven’t even got the support of your own region,” she said.

Let’s hope lessons have been learned as the 2018 tournament is the new target for an England bid. We’re not putting any money on England picking up that one either…

July 5 – Rossi Makes His Point

A TALE of sporting rehabilitation today that took place with the backdrop of one of the most dramatic and entertaining games in World Cup history.

Paolo Rossi burst on to the world stage with his displays for Italy in the 1978 World Cup in Argentina as his team made it to the semi finals helped by Rossi’s goals. Having also been top scorer in Serie A the previous season, the striker was tipped to go on and become one of the all time greats.

In 1979 his club Vicenza was relegated to Serie B so Rossi was loaned to Perugia – it was to be move that nearly cost him his career when, in 1980, he became embroiled in a match fixing scandal also involving AC Milan, Lazio, Bologna, Avellino, Taranto and Palermo. Despite protesting his innocence Rossi was banned from playing for two years.

Despite his long playing absence Italy manager Enzo Bearzot controversially included him in his squad for the 1982 World Cup in Spain. There was outrage among the Italian media and fans at what they saw as a waste of a place in the squad for a man who was nowhere near match fitness having not played a competitive match for two years.

The naysayers seemed to be proved right by the team’s insipid performances in their first three matches at the tournament. Three draws saw them scrape through to the next round with Rossi’s failure to find the net in any of the three matches seized upon by the press and supporters as evidence that he was not ready.

In the second round Italy and Brazil both won against Argentina to set up a winner-takes-all match between the two on this day for a place in the semi final. Italy needed to win while a draw would see the Brazilians go through.

The Italian team and Rossi came alive and within five minutes the much-maligned striker had given his side the lead with a powerful header. Now he was up and running, and so was the match. Brazilian captain Socrates leveled just seven minutes later. On 25 minutes Rossi intercepted a stray pass and scored again to give the Italians the lead they needed but with just 20 minutes left to play Falcão scored for Brazil and the match had swung back in their favour. All Brazil had to do was hold on and they were through, but Rossi had other ideas. On 74 minutes Italy won a corner and Rossi scored again to send the Tifosi into dreamland. Rossi had his hat-trick, and Italy had beaten the favourites to go through to the semi final.

In the semi Rossi scored twice as Poland we dispatched 2-0 and he bagged another in the 3-0 win over West Germany in the final. Italy were world champions for the third time and Rossi was again a national hero with Enzo Bearzot decision to include him in the team vindicated in spectacular fashion.

Incredibly, despite not scoring in Italy’s first four games, Rossi won both the Golden Boot as top scorer with six goals, and also the Golden Ball – a new award for the tournament’s best player.

Watch highlights from the match below and come back tomorrow to the website where the past lives on: O-T-F-D.

July 4 – It’ll End in Tears!

AS Americans celebrate the birth of their nation with fireworks, tailgating and a big dollop of apple pie, we thought we’d bring you a tale of what their former colonial masters do best – losing on to penalties to Germany.

Now excuse us as we flick through our ‘Rough Guide to England Penalty Shoot-out Losses Volumes 1-3′ book’… ah, here we are: July 4th, 1990 in the Stadio delle Alpi in Turin.

The 1990 World Cup went down as one of the dullest tournaments in history, dominated by defensive football and more diving than a Greg Louganis appreciation day, but England still managed to put their fans through the mixer in one of their most dramatic exits.

Optimism had been building in the England camp, as Bobby Robson’s men had battled through to the semi-finals after knocking out the Roger Milla and his plucky Cameroonians thanks to two Gary Lineker penalties.

Here they faced West Germany who were living up to all their stereotypes by efficiently dispatching Holland and then Czechoslovakia in the knock-out stages. This was the biggest clash between the two old enemies since England had thrown away a 2-0 lead in their 1970 World Cup quarter-final.

Central to England’s progression was the emergence on the international scene of midfield pair David Platt and Paul Gascoigne. George Best comparisons were being chucked around ten-a-penny by the English press and the public believed that the young Geordie genius would be the man that ended 24 years of hurt.

The semi-final in Turin was a tense affair, with England on top, but failing to take their chances. After an hour QPR defender Paul Parker went to charge down an Andreas Brehme free-kick, only for the ball to balloon of the pint-size full backs’ derrière and loop over the backpedalling Peter Shilton.

The Three Lions went for bust and twenty minutes later they got their reward when Parker, playing like a man who had a score to settle, crossed into Lineker who finished in textbook clinical fashion.

Extra-time came a-calling and this provided us with the defining image of the tournament. Gazza flew into a tackle on Tomas Berthold and was given his second yellow card of the tournament, meaning he would miss the final. Unlike, say, Roy Keane in 1999, Gazza took the news pretty badly, bursting into tears and spending the rest of the game looking like a lost school kid, as Gary Lineker urged Uncle Bobby to ‘have a word’.

The two sides couldn’t be settled in extra-time, so the path to the final became via the penalty spot. Lineker, Peter Beardsley and Platt all converted, but Stuart Pearce saw his kick saved. As is usually the way, the German’s just kept on coming, converting all of theirs, meaning that Chris Waddle, briefly the world’s most expensive player and purveyor of one of the games greatest ever mullets, had to score.

We all know what happened next. If he’d hit it a foot lower it would all have been different, but somewhere in space, Waddle’s spot kick is still rising. West Germany went on to defeat Argentina in the final, thanks, somewhat predictably, to a soft penalty.

See a recap of both the Italia ’90 semis below, with a dose of Nessan Dorma chucked in for good measure and get some more World Cup history thrown your way right here tomorrow.

July 3 – Real Madrid Conquer the World

HERE in England we don’t really pay the World Club Championship too much cadence. Whether it’s the same ignorance that saw the national team not bother with the World Cup until 1950 or just an insular mind-set, the rest of the world tends to get much more excited about the tournament that declares the best club side in the world every year. This annual contest kicked off today in 1960 when European Cup winners Real Madrid took on Penarol, the Uruguayan winners of the new Libertadores Cup.

Back in it’s original inception the competition took the form of a two-legged play-off, with Madrid and Penarol kicking it off with a goalless draw in Montevideo before the two teams took the summer off and did all again in September at the Santiago Bernabeu Stadium in Madrid.

In front of 125,000 adoring Madristas Real tore Penarol a new one, going 3-0 up in the first ten minutes thanks to goals from the original Galacticos, Di Stefano and Puskas. Like so many before them, the South American side were unable to cope with the golden age Madrid side, eventually losing 5-1.

The Uruguayans got their revenge on Iberia the next year though, defeating Benfica to lift the cup.

Despite the apathy showing in Europe, and particulary England, down in South America it’s different kettle of fish entirely. Prior to the competition’s inception South American sides saw a chance to play Europe’s elite as a golden opportunity to show their skills to the traditional birthplace of the modern game. Football fans in Brazil and Argentina even got excited by Exeter City’s 1914 tour of South America, with Brazil even putting together their national team for the first ever time to welcome The Grecians.

As football in Europe has industrialised and become the all-conquering behemoth that we see today, South American’s football business nous has lagged behind, meaning that the challenge has now become one with a different focus.

With sides such as Internacional and Sao Paulo playing the likes of Barcelona or Liverpool in recent years where the wage of one European superstar will compare with the whole squad of plucky South Americans, the tournament is now a chance to upset the financial odds and prove that there is no one churns out quality young players like the South Americans.

The competition was given the old FIFA re-branding exercise in 2000 and is now known as the FIFA Club World Cup and features the champion clubs from all six continental confederations. Manchester United will be Europe’s representatives in Japan this December and will be favourites to face the winners of last nights clash between LDU Quito of Ecuador and Fluminense of Brazil, which we’re not going to hedge our bets with despite Quito’s 4-2 aggregate lead.

Watch highlights of AC Milan’s win over Boca Juniors from last year below and head over here tomorrow as we’ll hit you with some more footballing knowledge.

Podcast Reviews: Football Weekly from guardian.co.uk

Here’s a snippet of the BBC’s commentary from the FA Cup quarter-final between Middlesbrough and Cardiff:

Jonathan Pearce: “Can you place your finger on why there’s been so many FA Cup shocks this season, Mark?”
Lawrenson: “No.”
Pearce: “Thank you.”

Christ. How much does the TV license cost again? With the major TV networks appearing to have giving up on in-depth discussion and analysis of the beautiful game, it’s a good job we’re living in the digital age because fear not, there’s some good stuff out there. A couple of years ago the podcast became the latest buzz-word to be dreamt up by some IT boffins and thanks largely to Ricky Gervais’ successful foray into the medium, it’s only your Grandma and local ludite that hasn’t heard of them. Being the world’s most popular form of entertainment, football podcasts are in abundance so we thought we’d bring you a round up of our favourites in a piece we won’t title ‘Top of the Pods.’

Football Weekly from guardian.co.uk

Hosted by former Football Italia anchor James Richardson, the Guardian’s offering is, for our money, the best around. A quirky mixture of banter, opinionated chat and reports from across Europe, all up to the Guardian’s usual high-standard make the twice-weekly Football Weekly our first podcasting stop.

The revolving team of regular guests offer their two cents’ worth and also share stories like the time Peter Crouch went into a takeaway demanding free nachos before offering a running third-person commentary and on his meal (‘Crouchy’s having his nachos!”), and the fact that pod regular Barney Ronay once met Dennis Wise’s plumber who revealed that he has gold taps in all six of his bathrooms.

Ringing in from Madrid every week, Spanish correspondent Sid Lowe brings an always excellent summary of the goings-on in La Liga, with Serie A and the Bundesliga also superbly covered. Our only real criticism is the lack of lower-league coverage, but it seems as though if you nag them enough on their lively comment page then they do take notice.

Richardson’s laid-back style is at odds to the straight-men of other pods, and it’s a mystery why the man hasn’t been snapped up by one of the major broadcasters (with apologies to Setanta). He also hasn’t lost his ability to spin a pun, describing Brian McBride as “the best header from America since Monica Lewinsky” recently.

If it was a member of the England 1990 World Cup Squad it would be: Paul Gascoigne – always entertaining, but there’s a danger he’ll turn up pissed.