I seem to recall him blazing it over the bar, not wide, then laughing about it. I was right behind the goal and didn't find it funny at all.
Thing about Maier's gloves was their size - huge! I reckon they extended his reach by a couple of feet and filled half a goal when extended. Peter Bonetti had a nice line in green cotton gloves which worked quite well, could be reversed when soaking wet but were too close fiting to provide any unfair advantage.
I've heard all these Watney cup facts before but had no idea what the Watney cup was. Wiki says that it was a knockout competition played by two teams from each of the four divisions who had scored the most goals without getting promoted or involved in Europe. What I notice from the fixtures is that it was always the first division teams against the third division teams and the second division teams against the fourth division teams (presumably this was to give the second division teams the best chance of progressing and leave the teams from the top two division to contest the semi-finals). Fair play to Colchester and Bristol Rovers (division 4 and division 3 respectively) for winning the 2nd and 3rd years. Doubt that would happen if they reintroduced the competition today.
The Watney Cup was a short-lived (1970-73) pre-season competition which was competed for by the two top scorers in each of the four divisions of the Football League. It featured an experimental offside rule and was the first British tournament to use penalty shoot-outs to decide games
The Watney Cup was a barking idea. It was an attempt to manufacture more exciting attacking football and aimed to have high scoring games by pitching the top scoring teams from each division against each other in a pre-season goalfest. We appeared in it a couple of times if I remember. At about the same time we also entered the Anglo-Italian cup which put English and Italian second division clubs against each other in proper 2 legged European football. Hull City in Europe. And there wasn't even a war.
Which tournament was it that tried to make a 'penalty' kick be a one on one challenge between an outfield player and the keeper, with the ball starting on the centre spot? I thought it could have been the Watney Cup, but probably not.
They tried that in American Soccer at the time they recruited the likes of Pele and the German sweeper whose name I cant spell.
In 1969 El Salvador and Honduras went to war after a football match http://www.theguardian.com/football/2007/feb/21/theknowledge.sport
I saw that mode of deciding who wins a game at BP when we played the Tampa Bay Rowdies circa 1984. f**ked if I know who won. I was off me tits on Tiger Cola.
In 1993, HFS Loans League team Congleton were forced to call off a minute’s silence to mourn the death of the club’s oldest fan...when he walked into the ground. A Tanzanian soccer match was postponed in 1978 after the referee was arrested on the pitch and accused of smoking marijuana just before the kick-off. Could be the reason for some of the **** referees we’ve had this season
I'm with you on this one sir ben. Related factoid time... Pre first world war Man United captain, Charlie Roberts, earned the displeasure of the football beaurocrats by wearing short shorts. Shorts below the knee were customary at the time. He was also a leading figure in the unionisation of players. please log in to view this image
Is that not the campest stance you've ever seen on a man from the early part of the twentieth century. I bet he was bullied in the trenches.
