Vicini replied bitterly to sharp criticism. He’d culpably recalled Vialli, had broken up the Baggio-Schillaci tandem in consequence. He’d used five defenders, thus handing the midfield to Argentina. Vicini said he’d still put Vialli in, were the game repeated. He’d have replaced Giannini with the powerful Ancelotti, had it not been for Caniggia’s goal. Zenga said it was ‘impossible to save’.
The Turin semi-final went to penalties too. England’s sweeper this time was Terry Butcher, who seemed far more suited to the role than Mark Wright. For much of the game, in which England played steadily intelligent football, without creating many chances, the Germans looked a tired team. Not least their fulcrum, Lothar Matthaus, anonymous for the first half-hour, vigorously effective for 20 minutes, then evidently weary again.
Paul Gascoigne more than matched him, showing his familiar compound of strength, skill and originality. Alas, he would be reduced to tears—televised around the world—when a reckless tackle on Berthold got him booked for the second time in the tournament, condemning him to miss the Final, were England to reach it. Claudio Caniggia, foolishly handling the ball, knew already that this trivial foul would exclude him. Sad that offences should not be graded, when some were so much graver than others.
It was England who flagged at the start of the second half, but the goal with which West Germany led after 59 minutes was a freak. Tomas Haessler, the bright little midfielder—flanked this time by another, the fresher Thon—tapped a free kick to the formidable Andy Brehme. As Shilton came out of his goal, the shot hit Paul Parker, spiralled over the goalkeeper’s head, and landed in the goal. Would a younger Shilton have got back to save it? Perhaps, but such questions do scant justice to a great goalkeeper.
England brought on Trevor Steven for Butcher, adopted a 4-4-2 formation, and equalised with ten minutes left. Parker crossed from the right; clumsy confusion between Kohler and Augenthaler, unthinkable in a German defence, let the ball pass across the face of the goal, and the unmarked Lineker put the chance away.
In extra time, both teams hit the post, Chris Waddle for England, the ever adventurous Buchwald for West Germany, while Shilton saved gloriously from Matthaus and Klinsmann. Penalties would settle it, and when Stuart Pearce whacked his into Illgner’s flying body, the writing was on the wall. Thon then scored for Germany, Waddle sent his kick over the bar, and West Germany had reached another World Cup Final.
What a dismal one it would be. Argentina’s sour, negative tactics were clearly conditioned by the crucial absence of Caniggia, and the physical condition of Maradona. At Argentina’s training camp, out at Trigoria, Roma’s ground, there was a violent incident when police stopped Maradona’s brother, at the wheel of his Ferrari. A security guard was knocked down and kicked. A fitting prelude, perhaps, to what would happen in the Olympic stadium.
Altogether, Argentina had four players suspended; and two more would be sent off. That Codesal should be picked to referee the Final seemed to have more to do with the fact that his father-in-law, Javier Arriaga, was a member of the Referees’ Committee than with any evident ability. Still, no referee would have welcomed a match like this.
Maradona was jeered throughout by a crowd incensed by his faux pas in Naples. West Germany dominated a dull, sterile first half. Rudi Völler took none of four chances. He and Klinsmann, closely marked, looked tired.
After half-time, the game grew harsher. When Klaus Augenthaler was blatantly tripped in the box by Goycoechea, Germany had far stronger claims for a penalty than that which won the match. But when Monzon was expelled after 64 minutes for a shocking foul on Klinsmann, Argentina looked doomed. Twenty long minutes later, Sensini brought down Völler in the area, and Codesal gave a penalty. Argentina protested furiously, and seemed to have a pretty good case. But a spot kick it was, and though Goycoechea dived perceptively to his right, Brehme’s penalty flew inside the post.
Two minutes later, Dezotti grabbed Jürgen Kohler by the throat, as he tore after a ball which had run out of play; and followed Monzon to the dressing-rooms. A sad, crude end to a World Cup; but perhaps not an inappropriate one.
The third-place match between Italy and England in Bari had been a pleasant, meaningless contrast. England, without Gascoigne, did what they could. A fine header by David Platt equalised a goal by Baggio, the fruit of a moment’s distraction by Shilton in his last England game. Seven minutes from time, Parker lost balance, tripped Schillaci, and that embattled little man concluded his World Cup by converting the penalty.
RESULTS: Italy 1990
First round
Group A
Rome, Florence
Italy 1, Austria 0
Czechoslovakia 5, USA 1
Italy 1, USA 0
Austria 0, Czechoslovakia 1
Italy 2, Czechoslovakia 0
Austria 2, USA 1
GOALS
P W D L F A Pts
Italy 3 3 0 0 4 0 6
Czechoslovakia 3 2 0 1 6 3 4
Austria 3 1 0 2 2 3 2
USA 3 0 0 3 2 8 0
Group B
Milan, Bari, Naples
Argentina 0, Cameroon 1
Romania 2, Soviet Union 0
Argentina 2, Soviet Union 0
Cameroon 2, Romania 1
Argentina 1, Romania 1
Soviet Union 4, Cameroon 0
GOALS
P W D L F A Pts
Cameroon 3 2 0 1 3 5 4
Romania 3 1 1 1 4 3 3
Argentina 3 1 1 1 3 2 3
Soviet Union 3 1 0 2 4 4 2
Group C
Turin, Genoa
Brazil 2, Sweden 1
Costa Rica 1, Scotland 0
Brazil 1, Costa Rica 0
Scotland 2, Sweden 1
Brazil 1, Scotland 0
Costa Rica 2, Sweden 1
GOALS
P W D L F A Pts
Brazil 3 3 0 0 4 1 6
Costa Rica 3 2 0 1 3 2 4
Scotland 3 1 0 2 2 3 2
Sweden 3 0 0 3 3 6 0
Group D
Milan, Bologna
Colombia 2, UAE 0
West Germany 4, Yugoslavia 1
Yugoslavia 1, Colombia 0
West Germany 5, UAE 1
West Germany 1, Colombia 1
Yugoslavia 4, UAE 1
GOALS
P W D L F A Pts
West Germany 3 2 1 0 10 3 5
Yugoslavia 3 2 0 1 6 5 4
Colombia 3 1 1 1 3 2 3
UAE 3 0 0 3 2 11 0
Group E
Verona, Udine
Belgium 2, South Korea 1
Spain 0, Uruguay 0
Spain 3, South Korea 1
Belgium 3, Uruguay 1
Spain 2, Belgium 1
Uruguay 1, South Korea 0
GOALS
P W D L F A Pts
Spain 3 2 1 0 5 2 5
Belgium 3 2 0 1 6 3 4
Uruguay 3 1 1 1 2 3 3
South Korea 3 0 0 3 1 6 0
Group F
Cagliari, Palermo
England 1, Ireland 1
Holland 1, Egypt 1
England 0, Holland 0
Egypt 0, Ireland 0
England 1, Egypt 0
Ireland 1, Holland 1
GOALS
P W D L F A Pts
England 3 1 2 0 2 1 4
Ireland 3 0 3 0 2 2 3
Holland 3 0 3 0 2 2 3
Egypt 3 0 2 1 1 2 2
Second round
Naples
Cameroon 2, Colombia 1
Bari
Czechoslovakia 4, Costa Rica 1
Turin
Argentina 1, Brazil 0
Milan
West Germany 2, Holland 1
Genoa
Ireland 0, Romania 0
Ireland win 5–4 on penalties
Rome
Italy 2, Uruguay 0
Verona
Yugoslavia 2, Spain 1
Bologna
England 1, Belgium 0
&nb
sp; Quarter-finals
Rome
Italy 1, Ireland 0
Milan
West Germany 1, Czechoslovakia 0
Naples
England 3, Cameroon 2
Florence
Argentina 0, Yugoslavia 0
Argentina win 3–2 on penalties
Semi-finals
Naples
Argentina 1, Italy 1
Argentina win 4–3 on penalties
Turin
West Germany 1, England 1
West Germany win 4–3 on penalties
Third-place match
Bari
Italy 2 England 1
Zenga; Baresi; Bergomi, Shilton; Wright
Ferrara, Vierchowod, (Waddle); Stevens,
Maldini; De Agostini Parker, Walker,
(Berti), Ancelotti, Dorigo; Steven, Platt,
Giannini (Ferri); McMahon (Webb);
Baggio, Schillaci. Beardsley, Lineker.
SCORERS
Baggio, Schillaci (penalty) for Italy
Platt for England
HT (0–0)
Final
Rome
West Germany 1 Argentina 0
Illgner; Augenthaler; Goycoechea; Lorenzo,
Berthold (Reuter), Serrizuela, Sensini,
Kohler, Ruggeri (Monzon),
Buchwald, Brehme; Simon, Basualdo,
Littbarski, Haessler, Burruchaga
Matthaus; Völler,, (Calderon), Troglio,
Klinsmann. Maradona, Dezotti.
SCORERS
Brehme (penalty) for West Germany
HT (0–0)
USA
1994
Eventually it had to happen, and in Los Angeles, in July 1994, it did. A World Cup which, controversially but sensibly given to the United States, had attracted the most colossal crowds, ended not with a bang but with a whimper. A double whimper, you might say. For not only was it an ineffably dreary, negative, disappointing Final: it was, horrifically and inexcusably, decided on penalty kicks. It is telling that neither of the two World Cup Final’s managers wanted a replay for the very good—or very bad—reason that each knew his players were exhausted. This was directly attributable to the bloated format, the burden on players compounded by the staging of so many matches in the oppressive heat of early afternoon. The competition, supposedly the most important in football, had again been prostituted to European television.
The title was won not by a dazzling Brazilian team, such as those of 1982 and 1986, but by a dull, functional one which relied heavily on the inventive brilliance of Romario and Bebeto up front, scarcely served by a pedestrian midfield. At least there was the consolation that Italy’s duller team didn’t win. It was deeply significant that, even after the azzurri had come so close to ultimate success, the great Italian soccer public still had little time for its team. And less time still for its manager, Arrigo Sacchi, whose perverse choices of tactics and personnel alienated the fans.
Greater blemishes still on the tournament were the horrific murder of the Colombian player, Andres Escobar, on his return home after his team’s mysterious defeat by the USA; and the disqualification of Argentina’s illustrious Diego Maradona, found guilty of taking a cocktail of drugs.
I was always convinced that, at least from a financial point of view, a World Cup held in the United States was bound to be a colossal success. The argument that soccer in America was a minor sport, that no real national competition had existed since the collapse of the North American Soccer League years earlier, seemed spurious to me. The colossal crowds which attended the soccer tournament in California during the 1984 Olympics had convinced me that American fans, ‘event snobs’ that they are, would flock in still greater numbers to the premier competition of them all. So, indeed, they would.
The engine behind America’s bid and their subsequent preparation was a Californian lawyer called Alan Rothenberg, who had been pushed into office as President of the American soccer association by FIFA, who weren’t satisfied with the previous incumbent. Rothenberg was a dynamic organiser, but in no real sense a football man. He refused to take a salary, but agreed to a payment after the World Cup was over. It was subsequently officially announced to be $7 million, though there were those who whispered it was even higher, a source of dismay to the army of unpaid volunteers who’d made the running of the World Cup possible.
The choice of stadiums was in several instances controversial. FIFA, as obsessed with novelty as were the American organisers, were misguided enough to go for the ghastly indoor Silverdome at Pontiac, near Detroit. In the first place, the perversity of choice cost the organisers a fortune. The grass had to be grown in California, after a regiment of scientists had pondered the best way to lay it. Enormous rectangles of turf were transported vast distances to be put down and glared on night and day by the stadium’s electric lights. Malodorous, stuffy and oppressive, it was a venue which, amazingly, had no airconditioning to lighten the players’ burden, and the space between touchlines and lower seating was minimal.
Orlando, in Florida, was another highly debatable choice. If the ideal stadium, the Joe Robbie, wasn’t available at the time—and there was some dispute about that—then the Orange Bowl, where Germany had played Argentina in the previous year’s mini-tournament, would surely have been far preferable to Orlando. There, the possibility of afternoon storms condemned the teams to play at noon in atrocious heat. It was alleged that, just as the organisers hoped to strike a deal with General Motors in Detroit, so they’d hoped to come to terms with the Disney organisation, located near Orlando. This, however, was an ambition which backfired. Disney wanted complete control over the ultimately vulgar and faintly ludicrous opening ceremony. The organisers didn’t want to give it to them. Perhaps if they had we’d have been denied the diverting spectacle of famous stars falling through the platform of the dais and, in the case of Diana Ross, the singer, failing to ‘score’ in an open goal from just a few yards.
There were serious deficiencies, too, over the two Californian stadiums, at Stanford and Los Angeles. Neither would have been passed as adequate in most West European countries and, had the spectators been less malleable, there could have been serious consequences.
In the event, however, all was pretty peaceful. The elimination of England, and by extension their notoriously violent and provocative fans, may have had something to do with that. But the eager expectations of those dinosaurs of the American sporting press, fearful for the future of their native sports, that there would be rioting and mayhem, were utterly disappointed.
England’s failure to qualify was a particularly abject one, made all the more so by the gallant achievement of the Republic of Ireland in reaching the finals for a second successive time. Graham Taylor, former guru of the long-ball game at Watford, and a most contentious choice to succeed Bobby Robson, staggered from one error to another.
Taylor had made a strange start in the autumn of 1990 when, before a European Championship qualifying match in Dublin against the Irish, he dropped Paul Gascoigne, preferring the small veteran midfielder Gordon Cowans (a choice all the more puzzling for a game in which the ball would spend a majority of the time in the air). Long afterwards, Taylor suggested that the deciding factor was Gazza’s state of mind at the time, but this seemed pretty much of an afterthought.
Not that Gascoigne would at any stage in the World Cup preliminaries do Taylor and England proud. At Wembley, when it seemed that England were coasting to victory against Holland, Gazza received an elbow in the face from the Dutch midfielder, Jan Wouters, cracking his cheekbone. Wouters proclaimed his innocence, but there were whispers from Holland that Gascoigne’s behaviour had been provocative. Out of the game for 16 months after an appalling knee injury in the FA Cup Final of 1991 between Spurs and Nottingham Forest—none the more bearable for being wholly his own fault—Gazza won the hearts of the Lazio fans when he moved to Rome, but failed in the two vital England away games of June 1993 against Poland and Norway. It was
in Oslo that Taylor, with an allusion to the dangers of what he called Gazza’s ‘refuelling’, would put the cat well among the pigeons.
England drew very luckily in Poland through a late goal superbly snatched by their substitute striker, Arsenal’s Ian Wright. How the Poles hadn’t killed them off earlier in the game, when they were rampant, was a mystery.
Taylor’s tactics in Oslo were self-destructive to a degree. In fact he’d been constantly chopping and changing throughout his reign, reluctant to commit himself to the long-ball methods which had always seemed dearest to his heart. He seemed obsessed with the fact that Jostein Flo, a big striker, had been used by Norway to come in on crosses, from a right-wing position, and get his head to them. So with no time at all to do it, and with a botched bid for secrecy, Taylor radically changed his formation, decided to use a big centre-back, Gary Pallister, as left-back to mark Flo, and produced nothing but confusion. Des Walker, chosen despite serious questions about his form, erred again on the first goal which followed a free kick, and defensive blunders in the second half gave away a second.
When England, the following season, travelled to Rotterdam to play Holland, their chances were slim. It seemed remarkable that the inept officials of the Football Association had allowed Taylor to stay in office. In the American tournament of 1993, England had even lost to the USA, though they played far better to draw with Brazil and lose narrowly to Germany in the Silverdome. They lost in Holland, too, though there was bitter dispute about the goal that killed them off.
The Story of the World Cup Page 40
