Most memorable World Cup?

[bobbybottler]

78 was good. Scotland being thoroughly embarrassing in the games they supposedly Were going to win and the West Germany v Austria fiasco

We'd just moved down from Edinburgh to Woodley in 1978. I thought that everyone would be supporting Scotland, and when they saw our car bedecked in "Scotland for the cup" ephemera and pointed and laughed it was with us, not.....

Anyway, this illusion was shattered for good during the Iran game. The Peru game earlier had been bad enough, my Mum rarely swore but by Christ the air was blue when Peru scored, and then again, and then again. But during the Iran game, I thought I could hear booing from the neighbs when Eskandarian* scored in the wrong net for Scotland and when they equalised later on I could clearly hear laughter from the nearby houses.

Fuckers.

I'd be inclined to agree with BTBB about 1974 but we watched it on a TV screen the size of a shoebox. Watching it on a 3D 60" wall monster like what we've got now, with Cruyff and Neeskens and Suurbier and Rensenbrink going crazy, and then watching the woeful Jack Taylor buckle under Beckenbauer's relentless sledging and Cruyff buckle under Vogts' constant fouling....mind blowing.

Anyway, 1982. I could appreciate it more, Scotland weren't humiliated, NI were wonderful, and England were unfortunate and perhaps could have done better.

World Cups seem to get shitter as you get older. Perhaps that's because I drink less.

* No need to wiki that one.

[Kitsondinho]

The first WC I saw on TV was '86, at the age of 3! My parents have pictures of me watching it, but I have only one memory.....my Dad getting pissed off at me for pretending to be dear old Diego in the back garden.....anyways.....For Eng 1990 has to my favourite WC...being allowed to stay up late to watch us!!! My favourite overall WC is 2002. I was at Uni so I watched every single game that was televised. There were so many amazing things about that WC that were outstanding. Brazil's goal fest with Costa Rica...The Germany/Ireland group......Becks and The Argies....FraLOLnce......S.Korea being given unbelievable decisions by the officials.....Senegal.....Ronaldo's hair......Ballack's sacrifice in the semi for his team......PortugaLOL......And much, much more! Loved it!!!

[Jackson Corner]

78 for me fixed by the government for the home team to win. Full of corruption cheating and fixed results. And watching the Jocks get trashed by Peru when the tartan army sold there houses believing they were going to win the thing. The manager with his head in his hands. the fans wanting there money back.

[BR2]

1966.
Went to two England games.
Nobody thought we had the slightest chance of winning but the final was the day when the world (or,rather,England)stopped.
The most memorable game for me was the one between Italy and Brazil at the world cup in Spain-in fact with Northern Ireland also massively exceeding expectations that tournament runs 1966 close in my eyes.
Argentina winning theirs was great to watch.

Was that the game with Paulo Rossi/Zico etc. Think it was 3-2 to the Italians. The first ever game of football i watched as kid. May have
set the bar too high as i assumed all games were like that, made me stop playing with my lego for a bit

Yes,Rossi scored a hat-trick and the score could easily have been something like 10-9.
Like you, I thought football would always be about high-scoring,attacking football when I saw Reading score 4 in my first game at Elm Park.

[floyd__streete]

Italia '90.

Had gradually got more interested in football in the 2 years since the Simod cup Final, culminating in an absolute memoribilia fest in the summer of 1990. Living at Shepherd's Hill, we spent every other day wandering over to the BP garage to try and negotiate swapping coins to complete our collections of the 24 nations. Best thing about these coins was that they were all minted to display the local name of the nation they represented. Who the hell were جمهورية ?

Also completed 'The Orbis World Cup Collection'. Two ring-binders full of stats and narrative which I studied like an Oxbridge candidate revising for his finals. One of the binders was basically a deluxe sticker album and when I wasn't obsessed with BP coins I was desperately hunting for genuine currency in order to procure packets of stickers.

Best memory was of watching the semi final as a family, one of the few times we'd all gather to watch the same thing. My younger brother hid behind the sofa and burst into tears when Waddle missed. Then again, he had a similar emotional outburst when we lost to Uruguay in a pre-tournament friendly, such was the build-up this tournament had in our household. In the previous round I had thrown a juvenile strop at us going 2-1 down to Cameroon, turned my back on the television and leafed indignantly through Orbis.

By the way, جمهورية if you didn't know are 'Egypt'. At school we had a sweep stake, obviously no money involved (these were simpler days) but you had the privilege of filling in your teams scores on Mr Charters wall-chart. Egypt, naturally, were out in the first round and I was particularly rattled when the girl I fancied drew out England, which wasn't the first time I wanted something which belonged to her.

[Still Hate Futcher!]

I still love the World Cup but the stand out ones in my lifetime were a little way back.

Italia '90 - probably the closest I'll come to seeing England win it.
France '98 - the only one I've been to. Saw Brazil twice which was a bit special, including Ronaldo's 1st ever World Cup goal.
Spain '82 - The Ita v Bra game and Tardelli's celebration in the final.
Mexico '86 - Hand of god, Maradona's 2nd v England, Linekar's hattrick v Poland, a great final.

[sputnik]

'74
The first one I ever watched, memories including
East Germany beating West Germany 1-0
Beckenbaur and Muller
Paul Breitner's goal v Chile (and his hair)
The Dutch, particularly Cruyff and Neeskens
The first World Cup finals red card (can't remember who though)
Collecting for this



not forgetting the Zaire defender's rush of blood to the head http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Bn2EmwIDizU

8 long years before I got to see England play in the finals in Spain. Disappointment has followed regularly since, some moments of excitement and drama, but most of it better left forgotten.

[Terminal Boardom]

Too young and stupid kick off times prevented me from knowing much about 1970. 1974 was brilliant if only for the Dutch and their total football approach. 1978 was hilarious for the Scottish over-confidence. Holidayed up there after the WC and took the piss. My favourite was 1982. Sure the second phase was pants but there was some great football. It has already been said but Marco tardelli's goal celebration is probably the best I have ever seen. As for the match between Italy and Brazil, that game had everything.

1986 was all Mexican waves and that cheating dago bastard. Still, the second goal he scored was quality. I quite enjoyed 1990 especially for the Cameroon kicking oxf*rd out of Argentina but the level of cheating and negativity throughout spoilt what could have been a brilliant tournament.

1994 and the USA. Enough said. 1998 in France was enjoyable even if England were unlucky to go out when they did. But what happened to Brazil? That was wierd. I enjoyed the 2002 version. packed stadia and the South Koreans going nuts. Again hideous cheating. Rivaldo wasn't it where the ball hit his leg and he collapsed to the ground holding his head.

2006 was a non event for me. The only highlight being the brilliant Argentinian goal after something like 27 million passes. As for 2010, that improved the moment England were knocked out.

[boycey]

You can chart how entertaining a world cup was by how many shots of England fans vs water cannons there were.


ipso facto, USA and Japan were shite.

Italy, France and Germany good.

[Albert Spangler]

1994, I was 13 and it was, imo, the last one where you only really knew about 20 players from the rest of the world before the tournament. Plus no England so great fun to watch random late night football.

I would reckon most people would pick either the one from their early teens for that reason or the one from their late teens because it was the first one they got utterly shanted watching. I was 17 for 1998 and 2002 was a) in the middle of my finals and b) in the morning.

I vaguely remember the opening ceremony when Diana Ross missed a stupidly easy penalty during her song.

And the mascot was caked Striker

She picked a hell of a day to quit smoking.

[Four Of Clubs]

As above - much influenced by age of when watched etc and the decreasing interest in latter years: due to over-hype re England and the 'flying jizz' commentary re anything Brazilian - especially when more recently they've proved to be as filthy and cynical as all the other competitors - but often 'card-proof'.

My Kids also like watching but probably have more interest in the 'forecast predictor' competition we've done (and in the EC Finals) since they were all old enough so from about 2006 ish. Sad indictment on modern football perhaps, that you can surge up the 'table' with a run of picking 0-0 or 1-0s

We've also involved the missus in trying to have 'themed' food nights - i.e. try and get an evening meal based around dishes from a particular country who are in action that day - had some surprising 'hits' - Paraguay or Chile and a few nr disasters (Polish Dumplings !)
Got the lady in 'Pau Brasil' round the corner very interested when we went in to ask about trad. footy watching fodder. Didn't like to own up to the personal views I hold about her team though.
Kids discovered something called 'Antartica' - sort of a Samba version of Rubicon - god knows what's in it!

My interest was such that I believe I managed to VHS nearly every match @ the Finals from about 82 - 2006-ish - stopped doing that when VCRs had their day and as above the interest had waned somewhat.

So my personal faves were '74 & '82 - the two sides I held dear beforehand at each of these - did particularly well too.

At '74 I was enraptured by the Swedes - bunch of well-coached nobodies, who'd worked out what they were good at and stuck to a plan A (sound familiar?) ... was roughly equivalent to a 8-1-1 formation - with big Ralf Edstrom up front occasionally joined by a guy called Sandberg I think.
Rankles (but I am a sad cynical ol' git ) that whenever they show continual re-runs of the 'Cruyff-turn' and how wonderful the Dutch were - its never mentioned that they didn't actually win that game (was 0-0) and the Swedes hit the bar in injury time I think or certainly came close. Having said that the Dutch were breathless in the 2nd phase - especially vs the Argies (4-0) - and again vs Brazil?
Eventually the Swedes ran out of puff in the 2nd phase and on glue-pot pitches too - lost a game 2-4 to West Germany when they played completely out of character and went for it - led 1-0 for a few marvellous moments - and got it back to 2-2 after falling behind in a mad 3' spell after H/T. I think they eventually finished 3rd in the group - lost out to Poland - Lato/Deyna etc - were just too mobile for them.

In '82 I drew Italy in the sweep at work and got roundly mocked when they stank the place out in a group with Poland Cameroon and Peru. They qualified for the 2nd phase without winning ahead of Cameroon on 'Goals Scored' and were placed as an 'also ran' in the media's view - in a pot with Argentina and Brazil.
... and we know the rest courtesy of Mr Rossi.
The French played some great stuff in that tournemant too - and went on to be even better in the '84 EC (Platini, Giresse, Tigana & Fernandez.)

[just some bloke]

1982 - I was young and naive enough (8 years old) to genuinely believe England would win the thing easily. The education I got in how that was simply not the case has helped soften the blow ever since

1990 - For any England fan aside from those old enough to remember 1966 this was of course the closest we got to winning it, so it seemed to last forever. So many memories of this one, already documented by others here. We were so, so fucking close to actually winning that. England would have won the final if they'd got past Germany.

2002 - The only World Cup I've seen live games at. I went to games in both Japan and Korea and the whole thing was just brilliantly done. The Japanese excelled in their support for the countries that played there, and the Koreans excelled in the terrific run they had to the semi-final. That was a wonderful, wonderful tournament.

[Schards#2]

Agree this is largely dictated by age, hence, the most memorable for me were 1978 and 1982 when aged 14 and 18 respectively. Though, having said that, looking back at the highlights, some of the goals in 1978 were a bit special.

Worst - 1994 and 2010

[From Despair To Where?]

I know there's a lot of emotional attachment to 1990 because of the whole England thing, which is fair enough but from a purely footballing perpective it really was the worst tournament in my lifetime by a long way. Dull, stultifying, cynical football from first to last, from Cameroon bludgeoning their way through Argentina (although II did enjoy the game for precisely that reason) in the opener to the worst final ever.