Except he wasn't Rusiian, he was from Azerbiijan which was part of the Soviet Union. He and fellow citizens of Azerbijan would be most upset to be described as Russian. He is such a folk hero there that their national stadium is named after him. Motson was another who always refered to the USSR as Russia. He once spent the whole of one World Cup game calling them Russia despite them having CCCP, the Cyrillic for USSR on their shirts and not one of the players having Russian as a first language.
You are always free to go and live there. For sme reason Scots bugger off at the first opportunity which is why their population is about the same as it was after the war whilst ours has gone up by millions.
Remember watching that. With the goalie being a Celtic player even the Rangers fans joined in with the joke at the time of "What time is it?" - "Nearly ten past Haffey". In fact they may have started it.
I think he emigrated to Australia not long after the match as well I love the commentary on those old videos as well.
Hard to think Kenneth Wolstenholme was criticised for being over excitable and accused of being almost hysterical. I would prefer his calm, measured commentary in correct English to the semi literate outpourings of people nowadays.
All your statements are correct - I am keenly aware of the history of The Russian Empire, the creation of the Russian Soviet Federation of Soviet Republics and subsequently the USSR (CCCP). Unfortunately, and inaccurately as you point out, the newly created Sovereign States were mainly referred to as Russia by most of the other Western (and Eastern for that matter) countries & states (e.g. The Russian Front in WWII). That situation is now changing given the breakup-up of the Soviet Union in recent history. For expediency I tagged the linesman as a Russian as that is how he was mostly identified as in '66. Erroneously to be sure.I was aware of his true nationality when I made my original post. No intention on my part to insult him or his countrymen. Nice to hear that he has been honoured with a stadium named after him in his homeland - a fact I was unaware of.
The Beckham free kick against Greece for pure excitement and elation. Beating Germany 5-1 for the night out I had afterwards.
Euro '96 & Italian '90 were amazing tournaments. But I think Germany 1 England 5 is probably my favourite!
I'd go Gascoigne's goal for the England moment in general. Being at Wembley for an England hat-trick (Scholes vs Poland) for the best with me there.
I liked it when we beat Holland at Euro 96 as they had an aura about them as being great players, most of the best memories from the 80's when I was just a kid and didn't know footballers were mostly overpaid nonces
