by Nick Holt
The game reflected these different attitudes and moods. Brazil attacked from the start – they knew no other way – but could have gone behind when a roll-back-the-years run from Kempes set up Barbas, whose header was too close to Peres. Brazil didn’t have to wait long for their first goal. Éder hit a free-kick from thirty-five yards – Argentina weren’t taken by surprise, they had a four-man wall. The ball brushed the fingertips of Fillol, at full stretch, and bounced back off the bar. There were no other Argentinians on the TV screen apart from the grounded goalkeeper when Zico nipped in ahead of his colleague Serginho to poke in the rebound. The difference in energy and desire was marked. The only shock of the first half was that Brazil didn’t add further goals. Falcão went close twice, the second time after a delightful headed one-two with Sócrates set up a fierce volley that dipped just too late. Peres tipped over a Passarella header just before half-time but one sensed that Argentina were hanging on by their fingernails.
For Kempes it was an anti-climactic end to his World Cup career, substituted at half-time by Díaz. Díaz, the young River Plate forward so widely touted as one of the stars of the game for years to come, won his last cap here at the age of only twenty-two. The same wasn’t true of Maradona, the one player who seemed up for this challenge, and he should have had a penalty at the beginning of the second half when he got past Júnior and the Brazilian full-back chased him and brought him down. The watching Italian coach noted how easily the full-backs were taken out when Brazil were not in possession.
The second Brazilian goal was a masterpiece, at once clinical and beautiful. Sócrates advanced and squirted a pass to Éder, immediately running towards the area, creating space behind him. Zico, normally ahead of his captain, filled the space and received the return from Éder. The No.10 slid the ball carefully between two defenders for Falcão, overlapping on the right in familiar style. Falcão’s cross was inch perfect, Serginho barely had to move to head home – good job, he usually missed when he had to move. It was the São Paulo centre-forward’s only goal of the tournament. Serginho looked cumbersome, especially in comparison with the fluidity and grace of his colleagues. Brazil’s hottest new forward talent, Careca, was injured before the tournament, but Santana liked the big front man, and would probably have picked Serginho anyway, in spite of the catcalls from the press box.
The last goal was just as good, but involved only two players. Left-back Júnior started the move with a purposeful run and finished it like a born striker with a sprint into the box and nonchalant prod past Fillol; the man in the middle was Zico, who received the ball with one touch and played it back into Júnior’s path through a forest of players. This was a different Zico from the wastrel talent who did so little at the 1978 tournament.
A few minutes later we saw the other side of Júnior, messing about in his own penalty area and nearly letting in Maradona, whose clever chip just cleared the crossbar. Maradona was involved again moments later when the Brazilian substitute Batista went in high on Barbas; Maradona didn’t wait for the referee to pronounce judgement but flew in waist high at the Brazilian and got a deserved red card. It was the kind of reckless response to frustration and perceived injustice that let Maradona down a number of times throughout his career. Yes, he was subjected to some excessively physical marking, but so were Pelé and Puskás and Stanley Matthews before him, and they managed restraint. Maradona had a bigger weapons rack even than Pelé, but they misfired more often and more disastrously.
Argentina went home and rebuilt their political system and their football team. Brazil moved on to a showdown with an Italian side that had discovered a little self-belief and, more importantly, had a defence that might have some answers to the Brazilian attack.
WORLD CUP CLASSIC No.12
Referee: Avraham Klein (Israel)
Coaches: Telê Santana (Brazil) & Enzo Bearzot (Italy)
Brazil (4–2–3–1): Waldir Peres (São Paulo); José Leandro (Flamengo), José Oscar (São Paulo), Luizinho (Atlético Mineiro), Leogevildo Júnior (Flamengo); Toninho Cerezo (Atlético Mineiro), Sócrates (Corinthians); Paulo Roberto Falcão (AS Roma), Zico (Flamengo), Éder (Atlético Mineiro); Serginho (São Paulo). Sub: Paulo Isidoro (Grêmio) 69m for Serginho
Italy (1–4–3–2): Dino Zoff (Cpt, Juventus); Gaetano Scirea (Juventus); Gabriele Oriali (Internazionale), Fulvio Collovati (AC Milan), Claudio Gentile (Juventus), Antonio Cabrini (Juventus); Bruno Conti (AS Roma), Marco Tardelli (Juventus), Giancarlo Antognoni (Fiorentina); Paolo Rossi (Juventus), Francesco Graziani (Fiorentina). Subs: Giuseppe Bergomi (Internazionale) 34m for Collovati; Giampiero Marini (Internazionale) 75m for Tardelli
Cautioned: Gentile (Ita) 13m, Oriali (Ita) 78m
This was a undisputable classic, a serious candidate for the greatest match ever in the World Cup. In any other circumstances it would have been billed as beauty versus the beast, the exponents of beautiful attacking football against the cynical defenders of the legacy of catenaccio. Some of the press mistakenly did take this line, forgetting that the Italians needed to win, and could not afford to play on the back foot against this quality of opposition.
The Italian coach was the pipe-smoking Enzo Bearzot. Bearzot had only a year’s experience of club management on his retirement as a player, electing instead to join the national coaching set-up. He was Head Coach of the Italian Under-23 side for a few years and part of Valcareggi’s set-up during the 1974 World Cup Finals. After three years as assistant to Fulvio Bernardini, Valcareggi’s successor, Bearzot became Head Coach of the national team in 1977. He cemented his reputation with good showing at the 1978 World Cup Finals and the 1980 European Championships, when little was expected of the team.
Before the 1982 Finals had even started Bearzot was under fire from the Italian press, largely for selecting Paolo Rossi. Rossi had a good World Cup in 1978 and was widely accepted as one the best strikers around, but in 1980 he was implicated in the totonero scandal, an investigation that rocked Italian football when it revealed matches were being rigged by a betting syndicate. The scam was initiated by a restaurant manager, Alvaro Trinca, who owned a trattoria frequented by many of the Lazio squad. Trinca and his associate Massimo Cruciano, were trying to defraud the totcalcio (the Italian pools) but their scheme was far from foolproof, and they ended up losing significant amounts of money and getting in debt to a number of bookmakers – not a good idea in any country. The pair panicked and the police got wind of something illegal, especially when a Lazio player not involved in the fraud started airing his suspicions. Trinca and Cruciano even consulted an attorney about whether they had any legal redress against the players who accepted their money and failed to deliver the promised result!
The end result was the demotion of Lazio and Milan from Serie A and punishments for various other clubs, as well as a number of bans handed out to some high-profile players, including Albertosi, the former international goalkeeper. Easily the most high profile was Paolo Rossi; Rossi always denied involvement and the evidence against him was largely circumstantial and he-said-she-said. It is possible Rossi was a high-profile scapegoat and deterrent, and it is possible he was involved. Whatever the justice of it, Rossi was banned for three years. The sentence was later commuted to two, which got him back on the field in time for the World Cup Finals, but he had time for only three matches for Juventus before the tournament.
Nonetheless, Bearzot persisted with picking Rossi in the face of all the criticism, even when he produced some rusty and ragged performances in the opening games. Even in the win over Argentina Rossi struggled – it was the high-quality Italian defenders and the in-form winger Bruno Conti who carried that day. Bearzot got fed up with the press carping, and stopped any communication between the squad and the media. It was under these tense circumstances they were expected to match the best team in the world.
And make no mistake about it, Brazil were the best team at this tournament. The eighties was a boring football decade, and tactical innovation was rare. Virtually every team
played 4–4–2 or a variant and the subsequent match-up produced a lot of dull, unimaginative football. Even Brazil played a variant, but it was a variant that seemed to offer much more fluidity than other teams. Two big centre-halves protected Waldir Peres, a jumpy ’keeper, if not so flagrantly awful as Félix in 1970. Outside were two fullbacks, Leandro and Júnior, who liked to attack; Júnior in particular, gave the impression he was a frustrated inside-forward.
In front of the defence was the babysitter, Cerezo, strong, powerful and not without skill. Alongside him was Sócrates, the playmaker, who liked to receive the ball early and start the fun. Zico played in front of Sócrates, and would zip forward to form a second prong in attack, as well as dropping deeper to cover Sócrates’ occasional forays. Zico’s exceptional passing ability and shooting meant he was both scorer and creator – his weakness was a tendency to disappear when things weren’t going so well. Outside were Falcão to the right and Éder to the left – but it wasn’t unusual for either to pop up in the penalty area or on the opposite wing. Falcão was a quick, lively player, two footed and with great movement and intelligence. He was familiar to the Italians, having signed with Roma in 1980. Éder’s left foot earned him the nickname The Cannon (no explanation needed, surely?), and he was tough and strong; just as well, he was often needed to defend behind Júnior when the wanderer got a little over-excited.
In front of this array of genius was the powerfully built Serginho. No one quite knew why he was picked – maybe the others liked having a big lad to occupy the centre-halves – but it was doubtful he would worry the Italian No.5 Collovati.
Against this glittering array was the world’s best defence in front of the world’s most experienced goalkeeper. Dino Zoff may not have been as supple as he was, at forty years old, but he was a commanding presence in the area with over 100 caps behind him. Collovati, who had just crossed the city to join Inter from relegated Milan (they were dark times for the black and reds, two relegations in three years), was the ball-winner in the middle of the defence, Scirea the hoover behind him, unflappable and graceful. The left-back Cabrini was a veteran at the ripe old age of twenty-four, and on the other side Oriali, a midfield player, played almost an attacking full-back role while Gentile sat just inside him as the team bouncer. Benetti, the attack-dog from 1978, had gone, but his replacement, Tardelli, was just as steely and a much better footballer. These six were the dark-blue wall, and ahead of them were the flair players: Conti, the winger, Falcão’s team-mate at Roma, who was having a terrific World Cup, flitting from one flank to the other; Antognoni, the balletic Fiorentina captain, who seemed to glide over the grass; Rossi, the sharp-shooter, so good at moving off the shoulder of his marker; Graziani, the willing runner, nominally a second forward but one who frequently pulled wide to take defenders out of position or dropped into the space behind the centre-forward. With the wisdom of hindsight, it was madness to write off such a team, packed with quality and tough as tungsten.
Italy needed something special to happen before Brazil could impose their rhythm on the game, and they got the perfect start. You could hear the groans from the Italian press area when Rossi miskicked an inviting cross from Tardelli, but the complaints dried up a minute later. Conti wriggled away from his marker on the halfway line and made inroads up the right before switching play to Cabrini in acres on the left. Cabrini’s swinging cross was a gem, Júnior’s marking was pathetic and Rossi’s header was emphatic. Now you could hear the groans from the press of every country – a goal to the good, surely, Italy would entrench.
They couldn’t, the lead didn’t last long enough. Zico went clear only for Serginho to pinch the ball off his toes and scuff it wide of the post – Zico shrieked in frustration at the big man. Moments later Zico evaded Gentile again, this time with a stunning back-heel and swivel, and played a smart ball for Sócrates down the inside-right channel. Sócrates took a touch to get clear of Scirea, who didn’t dare dive in, and beat Zoff with a hard shot at his near post.
The game was poised again, and, for all Brazil’s brilliance, the early goal had given Italy a measure of self-belief. It had certainly done wonders for Rossi and he struck again when he cut out a rare loose ball from Cerezo, nipped past Luizinho and fired home – Waldir Peres should have done better than wave the ball past him. More shouting from Zico ensued.
Brazil had a lot of the ball in the rest of the first half, but couldn’t make it count. Zico screamed for a penalty when he slipped clear of Gentile again – he had proved harder to suppress than Maradona for the Italian enforcer – but he did the honest thing and got his shot away instead of going down, which swayed the referee.
The second half continued in the same vein – now, at last, we had the confrontation everyone expected. Brazil were scintillating, hitting heights of imagination and movement rarely seen, but the Italians were outstanding in their way, too. The referee was Klein of Israel, who had stood firm against Argentina in 1978, and the Italians knew they had to play it clean. They lost Collovati early to an injury and the replacement was the eighteen-year-old Inter defender Giuseppe Bergomi. Alongside Scirea Bergomi was superb, an unbelievably cool presence for a teenager. Outside them Cabrini and Oriali worked like demons to combat the Brazilian runners, while Tardelli and Conti were everywhere, hounding and tackling and trying to disrupt the Brazilian rhythm. For all the defensive skill shown chances came and went. Falcão shot across the goal and wide from the right, Zoff launched himself out of his six-yard-box to thwart Cerezo and Serginho tried a clever back-heel when he should have turned and thumped the ball. Brazil needed something out of the top drawer, the one reserved for Sunday best. It came from Falcão.
The midfielder had a lot of help from Cerezo. Sócrates fed Falcão the ball with a wall of Italian defenders in front of him. Cerezo, who knew he owed his team after his earlier error, set off a lung-bursting sprint around the back of Falcão to the Italian left. Cabrini left the middle to watch the overlap, and Scirea stayed put to cover him. The movement left the merest gap inside, so Falcão took a pace in to his left and hit a screamer past Zoff’s right hand. Sensational stuff.
The radio and TV commentators greeted this second equaliser as if that was that; the Italians had resisted manfully but genius will have its day. They underestimated Italy. Even while Brazil dominated Italy always looked dangerous. They left Rossi and Graziani well forward, and the latter’s work rate and running caused the Brazilian full-backs a dilemma; if they were too adventurous Graziani would fill in behind them and if Italy regained possession, he provided an immediate outlet for a long clearing pass. It was an option Júnior afforded them all game with a brainless performance. Italy won a corner from one such clearance. Conti swung it high into the box and the ball dropped from the aerial challenge to Tardelli, who hit half a shot with his left foot. Waldir Peres had the shot covered, so Rossi stuck out a leg and sent it the other way past his left shoulder. Italy were ahead again, and the misfit, who according to the astute readers of the game in the press box should not have been in the squad, had a hat-trick. Júnior stuck his hand up to claim for something, but he was out of position when the corner was won, played Rossi onside and wandered off the line just as the Italian hit the ball towards that corner. The second most over-rated Brazilian left-back of all time.
Italy might have sealed the game a few minutes later, when another break saw Rossi charge down the right and cut back for Oriali; Oriali unselfishly clipped the ball over for Antognoni, but he was ruled offside as he gleefully shot home – the linesman was wrong, a let-off for Brazil. In the last minute Éder took a free-kick from the left, which swung over everyone except Oscar at the back post. Oscar stooped and the ball flew towards the left-hand corner – where it was stopped by a diving forty-year-old. Zoff took the ball behind him, and not only saved it but held onto it, a miraculous save from the veteran. The Brazilians appealed, but the ball was nowhere near over the line. It was a dramatic end to an awesome game. That word, so overused, is entirely justi
fied. I can genuinely say that every time I watch it (and I never tire of doing so) I am filled with awe at the ability on display, both attacking and defensive.
GROUP D
France were without Michel Platini for their game against Austria, but his replacement, Jean Tigana from Bordeaux, was no slouch. Austria were light up front with Krankl’s miserable form continuing, and they gave France little trouble. Tigana and Giresse linked well, and France peppered Koncilia’s goal. The Austrian ’keeper was their best player but he had no chance with Genghini’s superb left-footed free-kick. Michel who?
Northern Ireland started well against the Austrians in the Vicente Calderón stadium in Madrid. They had the best of the first half and led through a Billy Hamilton header, made by another selfless run and cross from the indefatigable Armstrong. Austria reshaped and improved after half-time, and Pezzey cleverly diverted a drilled shot from Baumeister past Jennings for an equaliser. Northern Ireland were struggling in intense heat – both sides were, to be fair, the game was played at a ridiculous time – and fell behind from a set piece. The ball was touched to Hintermeier and at last his explosive shooting paid off as he belted the ball into the inside netting. As well no one in the wall got in the way, a doctor would have been required. This Northern Ireland team never lay down, and, when Martin O’Neill’s shot squirted loose off a defender, Jimmy Nicholl chased the lost cause, reached the ball ahead of Koncilia and lobbed it back into the middle for Hamilton to nod home his second.
Beating France, however, was a lot to ask even of this heroic Northern Ireland team, and it proved a bridge too far. France had found their feet – England would not have brushed them aside a second time – and they controlled most of the game, but the 4–1 score was flattering, and Northern Ireland had their chances. Martin O’Neill had the ball in the net but it was ruled out for offside – a decision somewhere between marginal and wrong. The move typified Northern Ireland’s verve; Whiteside cheekily back-heeled the ball between two defenders to O’Neill, who played a one-two with Armstrong and burst into the box to clip the ball over Ettori.
