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Author Topic: Football!  (Read 24068 times)

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An Apple Beatle

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Re: Football!
« Reply #460 on: October 26, 2008, 01:31:17 PM »

Come on you scousers....Damage that Chelsea record. heheheh
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Kaleidoscope_Eyes

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Re: Football!
« Reply #461 on: October 27, 2008, 05:10:26 AM »

^ And they did!!!!! Woohoo! Go Scousers!!!!
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BlueMeanie

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Re: Football!
« Reply #462 on: October 27, 2008, 07:13:41 AM »

Quote from: 15
Come on you scousers....Damage that Chelsea record. heheheh

That's not nice. :(
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An Apple Beatle

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Re: Football!
« Reply #463 on: November 07, 2008, 05:13:38 AM »

^But neccessary. (tongue2)

Shame about the yids (Tottenham Hotspur) in the league but at least my mama's team added some more blue insult. lol...Bravo Roma!
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Kaleidoscope_Eyes

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Re: Football!
« Reply #464 on: November 09, 2008, 06:58:29 AM »

Arsenal - Man U ; 2-1 !!!! Woohoo! (dance)
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fendertele

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Re: Football!
« Reply #465 on: February 01, 2009, 05:59:42 PM »

2-0 :) title race aint over yet  ;) ;) ;) wasnt much of a game up until then though. and what about the studding iin the corner tut tut!!! lucky boy ;)
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Joost

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Re: Football!
« Reply #466 on: February 17, 2014, 03:44:19 PM »

I've been reading mostly Dutch books and (auto) biographies of soccer players that most of you probably never heard of... The most interesting book I've read lately (although it wasn't very well written) was 'Heroine Godverdomme'. It's the autobiography of a guy who used to play drums in the most popular Dutch band ever (Doe Maar) but ended up as a homeless heroin addict. He recovered just a few years ago after a thirty year addiction. The probably most bizarre anecdote was that he once broke into a house to get money to buy drugs and that after going into a bedroom he saw a huge poster of himself. Wow.
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oldbrownshoe

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Re: Football!
« Reply #467 on: February 17, 2014, 06:11:32 PM »

A terrific book was published about 10 years ago in the UK called 'Brilliant Orange' by David Winner and it's all about the rise of Dutch football through the 50s and 60s.
It's easily the best (relatively) recent sports book I've read and, for Beatles' fans, touches on the youth culture of the 60s in Amsterdam.   

If you consider that they were born about a year apart, the achievements of Cruyff when compared to the achievements of George Best read like the achievements of The Beatles over Geri Halliwell!
Pre-Cruyff, Ajax seem to have been the equivalent of Brentford and Holland the equivalent of Luxembourg.
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Joost

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Re: Football!
« Reply #468 on: February 17, 2014, 06:30:15 PM »

Pre-Cruyff, Ajax seem to have been the equivalent of Brentford and Holland the equivalent of Luxembourg.
That's pretty heavily exaggerated and way too much credit for Cruijff.
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oldbrownshoe

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Re: Football!
« Reply #469 on: February 18, 2014, 11:31:46 AM »

You think?

The Dutch had a pivotal result some time in the 50s, a heavy defeat to either Belgium or indeed Luxembourg (can't remember which; 1-6?) that drew a line in the sand and within two decades they were the most admired (and best, even though they lost to Germany) team in the world.....this from a country who had never previously qualified for the competition.

And Ajax (and Cruyff) won three consecutive European Cups. That's THREE.
To put that in context, Arsenal have never won it and Man. Utd., who virtually define themselves by the competition, have scrambled, after numerous attempts, to the same number often via luck (Munich) and penalty shoot-outs (Chelsea).

The last one Ajaz won was in 1973, Cruyff joined Barcelona in, erm, 1973.
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Joost

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Re: Football!
« Reply #470 on: February 19, 2014, 09:06:24 AM »

The Dutch had a pivotal result some time in the 50s, a heavy defeat to either Belgium or indeed Luxembourg (can't remember which; 1-6?)
It's not hard to explain why the Dutch national team was so bad in the 1950s. Unlike in most other European countries, the national football association in The Netherlands staunchly held onto amateurism until 1954. Clubs were forbidden to pay their players anything. So a lot of the good players went to foreign clubs and were subsequently banned from the national team. The national team consisted entirely of amateur players from the Dutch league, who all had fulltime day jobs.

In March 1953 both the official national team and a team consisting of banned Dutch players played  benefit matches for the victims of the North Sea Flood. The official national team lost to Denmark in a home match while the banned players defeated the French national team in Paris. Go figure.

this from a country who had never previously qualified for the competition.
That's not true. The Netherlands qualified for the World Cup, and participated, in 1934 and 1938. Also, at the Olympic Games football tournament, which until 1930 was basically the forerunner of the World Cup tournament, The Netherlands won bronze medals in 1908, 1912 and 1920.

And Ajax (and Cruyff) won three consecutive European Cups. That's THREE.
And a year before Ajax won those European cups another Dutch club, Feyenoord, won the European Cup. Cruijff had nothing to do with that.

The last one Ajaz won was in 1973, Cruyff joined Barcelona in, erm, 1973.
It wasn't the last won, they won the European Cup again in 1995. And did you notice what Cruijff won with Barcelona in the five seasons he played there? Only one national title and one national cup, that's all.
« Last Edit: February 19, 2014, 03:56:36 PM by Joost »
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oldbrownshoe

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Re: Football!
« Reply #471 on: February 19, 2014, 05:39:47 PM »

So, mainly for political reasons and all this is gone into detail in the book, Dutch football wasn't exactly top of the tree after the war and even when Cruyff made his Ajax debut in the mid-60s.

But where was it ten years later? Higher or lower? Or should that be much, much, much higher or lower?

And well done for another Dutch club for winning the European club, but Cruyff won three! In a row! Can you imagine how much would be made of that by a club like Manchester United or Chelsea today? We'd never hear the last of it.

And have a heart for me forgetting that truly dire final in 1995!

Maybe you're too close to the subject to see how Cruyff might be/is regarded outside Holland.
I once picked up a Van Morrison fanzine and they'd recently done a poll to determine Van's best LP.
'Astral Weeks' was tenth!
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Joost

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Re: Football!
« Reply #472 on: February 19, 2014, 07:34:12 PM »

Football is a team sport. One exceptional player can't help "the equivalent of Brentford" win three European Cups or get "the equivalent of Luxembourg" into the World Cup final. Even with Messi Argentina didn't get past the quarter finals at either the 2010 World Cup or the 2011 Copa America. Even with Zlatan, Sweden didn't even qualify for the upcoming World Cup tournament.

Countries like Germany or Brazil will have four or five exceptional players at pretty much any given time. Holland is considerably smaller and we just have to be lucky to have a good generation.

Before the war, "we" were in the top four at four consecutive Olympic games. In the 40s and 50s we had a few world class players with Lenstra, Rijvers, Wilkes (star player of Inter Milan at the time) and De Munck. But unfortionately, they were all either banished from the national team or playing amateur football. That gave us a serious backlog, which was followed by what was probably a somewhat weaker generation. Then we had a great one in the mid-70s with not just Cruijff but also Neeskens, Van Hanegem and Rensenbrink. Then in the early 80s we couldn't qualify for any tournament at all, but in 1988 we had Van Basten, Gullit, Rijkaard and Koeman in top form and won the European Championship. Then we didn't play in another final for 22 years. At the last World Cup, we had Van Persie, Sneijder, Van der Vaart and Robben at their peaks, but at the upcoming World Cup we're probably going to suck again. We'll always have our ups and downs.

I know how great Cruijff was. But I very much disagree with the idea that Holland used to be "the equivalent of Luxembourg" and that Cruijff single-handedly changed that. Cruijff happened to be part of the first generation of really good Dutch players after the national football association finally got it's sh*t together and managed to catch up with the rest of Europe on an organizational level. And he might have been the best Dutch player there ever was, but he was also a complete diva who made enemies and created unrest wherever he went. In fact, I think that if Cruijff hadn't bullied goalkeeper Jan van Beveren (who was far superior to Jan Jongbloed) and Willy van der Kuijlen (all-time topscorer of the Dutch eredivisie) out of the national team, we might have actually won two World Cups in the 1970s...
« Last Edit: February 20, 2014, 07:37:48 AM by Joost »
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oldbrownshoe

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Re: Football!
« Reply #473 on: February 20, 2014, 09:02:52 AM »

I'm too busy to go back to 'Brilliant Orange' (try and get a copy if you haven't read it) but although the Brentford/Luxembourg links might have been my own, anyone reading that book would have come to roughly the same conclusion re. Dutch football, post war.
I didn't talk about 'why' it was like that, or the history/politics that preceded it, I just stated 'it was' like that!
Northern Ireland and Wales played in the 1958 World Cup, Holland didn't.

Of course Cruyff was selfish, arrogant, a maverick (a 60s maverick and he could only have come from that ultimate generation - see Lennon, Dylan, Beefheart etc.) but you definitely underestimate his reputation, in Britain at least.
The major events here in 1977 were (a) the Jubilee and (b) the Dutch, and specifically Cruyff, playing in a friendly at Wembley. I even seem to remember a will he/won't he play saga leading up to the game. The notion that Cruyff wouldn't be playing was like The Jimi Hendrix Experience taking the stage without Jimi Hendrix.

I know that 1988 team won the European Championship, but to my mind they were a shadow of the Cruyff era. Like comparing The Beatles to Wings. Even the kit (the 1980s.....shouldn't be surprised) was horrible.

As for one player making a huge difference to a team, I'd argue that Argentina wouldn't have got anywhere near either the 1986 or the 1990 World Cup finals without Maradona, and, although a different sport, Ian Botham pretty much turned around the Ashes in 1981 on his own. England were 500-1 to win the Third Test before he came in.

Anyway, today's not the day to dispute Cruyff's influence, today's the day to laugh at Arsenal.
I'd even put it in my diary at the beginning of the year.....'February 19th - Arsenal get knocked out of Europe'. It's as likely to happen as Mothering Sunday or Good Friday.

Erm, I trust you don't support Arsenal!
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Joost

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Re: Football!
« Reply #474 on: February 20, 2014, 09:47:30 AM »

Northern Ireland and Wales played in the 1958 World Cup, Holland didn’t.
By 1958 Holland had barely gotten used to (semi) professionalism, while the majority of the 1958 national squads of Northern Ireland and Wales played for big English clubs.

Of course Cruyff was selfish, arrogant, a maverick (a 60s maverick and he could only have come from that ultimate generation - see Lennon, Dylan, Beefheart etc.)
The people you mention were artists. Cruijff was a sportsman who played a team sport. Huge difference.

but you definitely underestimate his reputation, in Britain at least.
I once payed 100 euros for a signed copy of a Cruijff biography, so I don’t think I do.  ;D

I know that 1988 team won the European Championship, but to my mind they were a shadow of the Cruyff era. Like comparing The Beatles to Wings.
That’s your opinion. But fact is that, unlike Cruijff’s generation, they actually won a tournament. And in sports, that’s all that counts in the end.

Erm, I trust you don't support Arsenal!
No, PSV is the only team I support.  ;yes
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Bobber

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Re: Football!
« Reply #475 on: February 20, 2014, 10:06:08 AM »

Where was Cruijff during the Worldchampionship in Argentina 1978?

*steps out again*
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Joost

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Re: Football!
« Reply #476 on: February 20, 2014, 10:28:46 AM »

Good call.  ;D

The Dutch national team played two World Cup finals (1978 and 2010) and won a European Championship final without Cruijff's involvement. Ajax won the Champions League and the UEFA Cup without Cruijff's involvement. Feyenoord won the the European Cup and two UEFA Cups without Cruijff's involvement. PSV won the European Cup and the UEFA Cup without Cruijff's involvement.
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oldbrownshoe

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Re: Football!
« Reply #477 on: February 20, 2014, 10:45:22 AM »

That 1988 kit was horrible though, and, unlike the Cruyff side, I have no fond memories of that team.....and even less of the one that played in those dire semi-final and final games four years ago.

And I'd argue that it's much easier (not nearly as fun or interesting though) to be the bit that follows the initial explosion, .....see 'The Beatles'.

The 'Brilliant Orange' book is particularly good on the counter-culture of Amsterdam in the 60s (indeed I must fill my boots with some more mid-60s Dutch pop), but by 1988 the book is less interesting as it really only focuses on the matches. I don't think the pop culture, or the importance of football on it, of the time gets mentioned. Why would it?
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Joost

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Re: Football!
« Reply #478 on: February 20, 2014, 11:36:31 AM »

That 1988 kit was horrible though, and, unlike the Cruyff side, I have no fond memories of that team.....
Might the 3-1 against England have something to do with that? ;)

The 'Brilliant Orange' book is particularly good on the counter-culture of Amsterdam in the 60s (indeed I must fill my boots with some more mid-60s Dutch pop), but by 1988 the book is less interesting as it really only focuses on the matches. I don't think the pop culture, or the importance of football on it, of the time gets mentioned. Why would it?
Being Dutch and a football fan and having grown up in the 1980s, I can assure you that the 1988 European Championship was a HUGE thing. Beating the Germans and actually winning a final was an incredibly big deal. Mention "the 80s" to any Dutch male and you've got a good chance that the 1988 European Championship will be the first thing he mentions. And the whole madness that the supporters of the Dutch national team are known for now (with all the dressing up in orange, covering entire streets in orange, etc.) that didn't start in 1974. It started in 1988.
« Last Edit: February 20, 2014, 11:39:11 AM by Joost »
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Joost

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Re: Football!
« Reply #479 on: February 20, 2014, 11:44:37 AM »

But maybe we should continue this discussion in a football topic (not sure if there is one already).  :)
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