After I caught up on some South American league games that had been sitting on my DVR, I used my COVID viewing to alternate between 1966 WC qualifiers and 2014 CONMEBOL WC qualifiers. The list that made up the former was quite short because this was pre-VCR times and many TV stations lack any kind of systematic archival efforts until recently. In fact, most of the qualifiers I watched featured France because INA has archived those games. I quickly moved from qualifiers into the tournament itself.
I'd be curious to hear from others, especially folks who watched the tournament in the stadia or on TV. I have to say that the quality of the broadcasts is generally excellent. And every game exists with BBC commentary. I don't know how that worked at the time, since it seems like ITV mostly showed highlights and I don't know how many BBC channels were showing live football beyond BBC1.
Anyway, in general I think that West Germany, England, and Portugal were the three best teams. Portugal did seem to benefit from a fair amount of mistakes by keepers. I'd say that the defeat of Brazil and North Korea were the side's best efforts. But I think the England-West Germany final was the right final based on quality of the two sides in the tournament on the whole. But going into the final West Germany was by far the best team in the tournament even if they benefited from a man+ advantage in multiple games. I think the final itself was very exciting. This was the one game I had watched before, but it was nice to watch again after watching the tournament during the past two weeks. The game as a whole was very enjoyable for a neutral with early goals, late goals, and attacking play throughout. Unlike almost every other extra time I can remember in the WC, this one actually had goals. Of the final matches I have seen, this would certainly be near the top if not at the top. Of course, I'm sure England was criticized for giving up a last second goal in regulation time. The ball pinged around. That's hard to defend. The problem was how foolish they were when they had possession in West Germany's end during the last 2 minutes. They never took the ball into the corner, but instead seemed caught betwixt and between wanting to score again and wanting to waste time. But this, as I mention below seemed to be part of a larger trend in this WC when it came to getting on with playing the game versus time wasting.
Here are some specific observations that I noted as I watched the tournament in case anyone cares or wants to discuss.
The Good
1. The pace of play was quick. There seemed to be very little downtime, including no lawyering with the referees or rolling around on the floor. In fact, during MD2 when a Hungarian player went down and the trainer had to come on the pitch, another Hungarian player did the non-verbal, "Make sure you're watching the clock" motion even though the game was tied and Hungary was having a good run of play. Additionally, the team the scored often sprinted back to the center circle carrying the ball.
2. Even when the scorelines were lopsided, the games rarely lagged. Neither team in most games was interested in killing off the game by wasting time. Of course, sometimes a side would start to sit back with a lead or if the side seemed content with a draw, but the other side always went for it during these moments.
3. In most parts of the pitch, the short passing game was accurate, quick, and contributed to the energy and action described in #1 above.
4. I loved watching the various photographers bunched to the side of the goal as they tried to avoid getting hit by balls or run over by players.
5. Obviously the development of football talent around the globe means the each confederation (usually) contributes to a more exciting tournament compared to the mostly European and South American representation in this WC. With that said, I am a big fan of going straight from a group stage to the quarter-final stage. I really like tournament football and understand that the lack of days off wasn't good for players (every other day), but the smaller tournament did mean a more exciting and engaging reflection (for me at least) about each team. I didn't lose track of different sides like I do in a bloated WC or bloated Euros.
6. After West Germany scored their third goal in the 1/4 Final against Uruguay, a man ran out on the pitch wearing overalls (the short pants variety) and waving a flag. The BBC announcer said: "That's not a boy; that's a grown man" as if describing something for an old school nature program.
The Bad
1. The play in the final third was mostly atrocious. And on the whole, the goalkeeping was poor. I'd go so far as to say that the ability to take chances was radically helped by poor keeping otherwise the goals per game in this tournament would have been much worse.
2. Defenders constantly left their feet. When critics claim about the poor state of defending today, I'd encourage those folks to look back at this WC. There weren't a lot of goals but that was because the offense was crap in the final third. Defenders rarely need to leave there feet in the contemporary game. I would add that as the tournament progressed, players were better about avoiding this approach and stayed on their feet more often.
3. The referees seemed very unwilling to control brutal play other than the West Germany-Uruguay and England-Argentina matches. Seven games in and I had not seen one card come out, whereas today the refs would rightfully card players for some of the fouls. Bulgaria were hellbent on fouling Pele every time he touched the ball, for example. Yet, the ref never intervened by using yellow cards to control the fouling. It's not easy to feel to bad for the Brazilians, who took a similar approach to butchering opponents in the group match against Portugal.
4. The backpass. The elimination of the back pass was one of the best changes to the laws of the game, if not the best. I hate the backpass.
5. Not bad in the same way as the other parts of this list, but a real shame that Mexico didn't win any games because they were the better team in 2/3 of their group games and the lack of wins kept them out of the knock-out rounds. England outplayed Mexico, although Mexico sat back too much in that game compared to the games against France and Uruguay, but Mexico were better than Uruguay and France.
The Strange
1. Goalkeepers were unwilling to take goal kicks in many instances. Or they would play the ball short, the defender would pass it back, and then the keeper would punt. Neither the long goal kick nor the long punt is a smart play but I'm stunned that the keepers (and their coaches) thought the punt was more useful. Spain was one of the few sides to rely on the keeper throwing the ball, which resulted in an extremely accurate rate of the ball staying with the side (95+%???).
2. Sticking with the keepers. I have watched a lot of older or classic matches but not in succession as I have done with this tournament. The keepers were obsessed with bouncing the ball as if they were playing rugby or basketball. I don't remember seeing this same move in WC 70. I'll be starting Euro 68 qualifiers next and working my way to that tournament so I'll be curious to see if that general move starts to disappear from the game.
3. When the Hungarians were awarded a penalty against Brazil, the penalty taker stepped up but the rest of the team were nowhere near the penalty box. Had the taker missed, there was no chance to score on a rebound.
4. I don't think about an urban stadium as a location for exotic birds, but either some kid sitting near a microphone had an odd bird-noise maker or some kind of bird decided to grace the microphones with its vocal presence during Italy-USSR.
5. I noted above that the referees let a lot go. In fact, there was not a lot of lawyering but there were a few times when players put their hands on the ref and those refs didn't seem phased by that action. Yet, amidst this, the refs were obsessed with where free kicks were taken. And I'm not talking scenarios where players were being egregious with ball placement; rather, the players might have been off by a foot or two and in the center of the park and still the ref wanted a re-take because the ball was not in the *exact* location the ref expected.
Sorry, that's a long post. As I said, I made some notes as I watched so that certainly made it easier to generate something beyond a few sentences.
I'd be curious to hear from others, especially folks who watched the tournament in the stadia or on TV. I have to say that the quality of the broadcasts is generally excellent. And every game exists with BBC commentary. I don't know how that worked at the time, since it seems like ITV mostly showed highlights and I don't know how many BBC channels were showing live football beyond BBC1.
Anyway, in general I think that West Germany, England, and Portugal were the three best teams. Portugal did seem to benefit from a fair amount of mistakes by keepers. I'd say that the defeat of Brazil and North Korea were the side's best efforts. But I think the England-West Germany final was the right final based on quality of the two sides in the tournament on the whole. But going into the final West Germany was by far the best team in the tournament even if they benefited from a man+ advantage in multiple games. I think the final itself was very exciting. This was the one game I had watched before, but it was nice to watch again after watching the tournament during the past two weeks. The game as a whole was very enjoyable for a neutral with early goals, late goals, and attacking play throughout. Unlike almost every other extra time I can remember in the WC, this one actually had goals. Of the final matches I have seen, this would certainly be near the top if not at the top. Of course, I'm sure England was criticized for giving up a last second goal in regulation time. The ball pinged around. That's hard to defend. The problem was how foolish they were when they had possession in West Germany's end during the last 2 minutes. They never took the ball into the corner, but instead seemed caught betwixt and between wanting to score again and wanting to waste time. But this, as I mention below seemed to be part of a larger trend in this WC when it came to getting on with playing the game versus time wasting.
Here are some specific observations that I noted as I watched the tournament in case anyone cares or wants to discuss.
The Good
1. The pace of play was quick. There seemed to be very little downtime, including no lawyering with the referees or rolling around on the floor. In fact, during MD2 when a Hungarian player went down and the trainer had to come on the pitch, another Hungarian player did the non-verbal, "Make sure you're watching the clock" motion even though the game was tied and Hungary was having a good run of play. Additionally, the team the scored often sprinted back to the center circle carrying the ball.
2. Even when the scorelines were lopsided, the games rarely lagged. Neither team in most games was interested in killing off the game by wasting time. Of course, sometimes a side would start to sit back with a lead or if the side seemed content with a draw, but the other side always went for it during these moments.
3. In most parts of the pitch, the short passing game was accurate, quick, and contributed to the energy and action described in #1 above.
4. I loved watching the various photographers bunched to the side of the goal as they tried to avoid getting hit by balls or run over by players.
5. Obviously the development of football talent around the globe means the each confederation (usually) contributes to a more exciting tournament compared to the mostly European and South American representation in this WC. With that said, I am a big fan of going straight from a group stage to the quarter-final stage. I really like tournament football and understand that the lack of days off wasn't good for players (every other day), but the smaller tournament did mean a more exciting and engaging reflection (for me at least) about each team. I didn't lose track of different sides like I do in a bloated WC or bloated Euros.
6. After West Germany scored their third goal in the 1/4 Final against Uruguay, a man ran out on the pitch wearing overalls (the short pants variety) and waving a flag. The BBC announcer said: "That's not a boy; that's a grown man" as if describing something for an old school nature program.
The Bad
1. The play in the final third was mostly atrocious. And on the whole, the goalkeeping was poor. I'd go so far as to say that the ability to take chances was radically helped by poor keeping otherwise the goals per game in this tournament would have been much worse.
2. Defenders constantly left their feet. When critics claim about the poor state of defending today, I'd encourage those folks to look back at this WC. There weren't a lot of goals but that was because the offense was crap in the final third. Defenders rarely need to leave there feet in the contemporary game. I would add that as the tournament progressed, players were better about avoiding this approach and stayed on their feet more often.
3. The referees seemed very unwilling to control brutal play other than the West Germany-Uruguay and England-Argentina matches. Seven games in and I had not seen one card come out, whereas today the refs would rightfully card players for some of the fouls. Bulgaria were hellbent on fouling Pele every time he touched the ball, for example. Yet, the ref never intervened by using yellow cards to control the fouling. It's not easy to feel to bad for the Brazilians, who took a similar approach to butchering opponents in the group match against Portugal.
4. The backpass. The elimination of the back pass was one of the best changes to the laws of the game, if not the best. I hate the backpass.
5. Not bad in the same way as the other parts of this list, but a real shame that Mexico didn't win any games because they were the better team in 2/3 of their group games and the lack of wins kept them out of the knock-out rounds. England outplayed Mexico, although Mexico sat back too much in that game compared to the games against France and Uruguay, but Mexico were better than Uruguay and France.
The Strange
1. Goalkeepers were unwilling to take goal kicks in many instances. Or they would play the ball short, the defender would pass it back, and then the keeper would punt. Neither the long goal kick nor the long punt is a smart play but I'm stunned that the keepers (and their coaches) thought the punt was more useful. Spain was one of the few sides to rely on the keeper throwing the ball, which resulted in an extremely accurate rate of the ball staying with the side (95+%???).
2. Sticking with the keepers. I have watched a lot of older or classic matches but not in succession as I have done with this tournament. The keepers were obsessed with bouncing the ball as if they were playing rugby or basketball. I don't remember seeing this same move in WC 70. I'll be starting Euro 68 qualifiers next and working my way to that tournament so I'll be curious to see if that general move starts to disappear from the game.
3. When the Hungarians were awarded a penalty against Brazil, the penalty taker stepped up but the rest of the team were nowhere near the penalty box. Had the taker missed, there was no chance to score on a rebound.
4. I don't think about an urban stadium as a location for exotic birds, but either some kid sitting near a microphone had an odd bird-noise maker or some kind of bird decided to grace the microphones with its vocal presence during Italy-USSR.
5. I noted above that the referees let a lot go. In fact, there was not a lot of lawyering but there were a few times when players put their hands on the ref and those refs didn't seem phased by that action. Yet, amidst this, the refs were obsessed with where free kicks were taken. And I'm not talking scenarios where players were being egregious with ball placement; rather, the players might have been off by a foot or two and in the center of the park and still the ref wanted a re-take because the ball was not in the *exact* location the ref expected.
Sorry, that's a long post. As I said, I made some notes as I watched so that certainly made it easier to generate something beyond a few sentences.
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