Do you ever watch old football matches? (even matches before your era?)

SharpshooterTom

Just curious, I started watching football with the 1994 World Cup at the age of (nearly) 8. So any tournaments prior to that I would've been too young for.

The 2018 World Cup has made me interested in watching matches from previous tournaments and World Cup's, even some club football before my time (fa cups, European cup matches etc).

I was thinking of buying a good number of them off ebay, i.e. full matches from Euro 88, World Cup 1990, Euro 92 etc.

I'm a bit of history student of the game and take an interest in learning about players/matches from different era's to see what older people are talking about, e.g. Maradona, Platini, Van Basten etc.

Of course the further you back the standard of quality gets worse, so there's a limit, 90's football to me is as good as it is today, and "most" of 80s football holds up well today, but anything before that outside the big matches (World Cup finals/semi finals etc) would be of little interest to me.

Anyone? Or am I just a weird football anorak/nerd?

HalloweenJack

I watch highlights of stuff but I never re-watch entire matches, old or recent. Re-watching particularly memorable or important penalty shoot-outs is as close as I'd get to it.

SharpshooterTom

HalloweenJack wrote: »

I watch highlights of stuff but I never re-watch entire matches, old or recent. Re-watching particularly memorable or important penalty shoot-outs is as close as I'd get to it.

Even stuff before you were born/before your time?

Knex*

Growing up I use to watch the videos of all the old World Cup Tournaments. A narrator would talk you through the history of the game around that time, the build ups, expectations, and then show a bunch of clips from the matches.

Used to fascinate me, especially the ones where Pele was present. Must see if I can dig up the name of the videos. I had a bunch of them.

These days we're so saturated with football, and it's so easy to watch a game from anywhere in the world, it's harder to find motivation to do more than watch a couple of clips on YouTube of whatever historic player crosses your mind from time to time.

keano_afc

Absolutely. Its great to see football back when tackles were allowed and there was no Neymar style histrionics. ESPN Classic was a great channel, there was a great range of games from the 70s and 80s. I wish they didnt get rid of it.

ThomasFlynn

ThomasFlynn wrote: »

Of course the further you back the standard of quality gets worse, so there's a limit, 90's football to me is as good as it is today, and "most" of 80s football holds up well today, but anything before that outside the big matches (World Cup finals/semi finals etc) would be of little interest to me.

Brazil 1970, the Dutch team of the 70s, Leeds practising rabonas and backheels against Southampton, Liverpool...lots of the beautiful game was played in the 1970s.

Chardee MacDennis

Don't watch Ireland v Egypt from 1990 anyway....

I've rewatched the CL final from 2005 a few times in the background but thats about it.

dfx-

Somewhat similar to Knex., I think. When growing up, I'd watch VHS (:eek:) of games or compilations of notable teams - usually Brazil 58/70/82 or tournament recaps.

I'd still happily sit down and rewatch that sort of World Cup summary stuff, pre-2002 I'd say.

Donnielighto

I'd love an football version of reeling in the years.

SharpshooterTom

Chardee MacDennis wrote: »

Don't watch Ireland v Egypt from 1990 anyway....

I've rewatched the CL final from 2005 a few times in the background but thats about it.

My dad (who sadly longer is with us) told me England 1-1 Ireland was a long ball hoof fest, loved the result but told me the game generally was terrible.

What about Holland v Ireland? Jack Charlton's Ireland rarely did 3-3 thrillers.

I was too young to remember any of this, was only 4 a month after the WC finished, but I'm thinking over time of getting perhaps all the 52 full matches, I'm a WC nut and thus incredibly sad enough to undertake this task, like to get Euro's 88 and 92 as well maybe.

Iused2likebusts

ThomasFlynn wrote: »

My dad (who sadly longer is with us) told me England 1-1 Ireland was a long ball hoof fest, loved the result but told me the game generally was terrible.

What about Holland v Ireland? Jack Charlton's Ireland rarely did 3-3 thrillers.

I was too young to remember any of this, was only 4 a month after the WC finished, but I'm thinking over time of getting perhaps all the 52 full matches, I'm a WC nut and thus incredibly sad enough to undertake this task, like to get Euro's 88 and 92 as well maybe.

Holland Ireland was another poor game and the last 15 mins were a farce as both teams just knocked the ball about knowing both teams would qualify with the result the way it was.
Ireland 1 Russia 1 from euro 88 was a great performance by Ireland which we probably deserved to win. Russia went on to reach the final.

5starpool

Even at the time with all the hype I remember thinking that the quality of football matches in world cup 90 was absolutely awful, so I'd advise against watching them all even if you could. There were a couple of exceptions such as Germany 4-1 Yugoslavia, England 3-2 Cameroon and the Germany Holland match with 'that' incident, although it was the drama of that match more than the quality that stands out. Probably a few more good games, but lots of them were awful.

5starpool

5starpool wrote: »

Even at the time with all the hype I remember thinking that the quality of football matches in world cup 90 was absolutely awful, so I'd advise against watching them all even if you could.

They were. It was a bad World Cup, the epitome of that end of 80s football, an era when Steau Bucharest and Red Star Belgrade gave us very forgettable grim European Cup finals. The brightest light in club football was Italian, which should say something.

That's why I think the OP may be shortsighted to say he'd go back to the 80s but not the 70s. I wouldn't say the end of the 80s were a better time for football than the beginning of the 70s.

SharpshooterTom

Deleted User wrote: »

That's why I think the OP may be shortsighted to say he'd go back to the 80s but not the 70s. I wouldn't say the end of the 80s were a better time for football than the beginning of the 70s.

I'm not expecting it to be very good, I'm not viewing it for entertainment, I'm viewing it for the sake of history. I'm also interested in it seeing lots of games from the 1994 and 1998 World Cups as well (even though I saw some of them live I was still very young to appreciate them at the time).

I actually watched the full match Italy v Argentina 1990 SF and I have to say I thought that was surprisingly good, I'd rank it a better than both the 2 SF's of this years World Cup. Although I expect that to be an aberration of many other poor games of that WC, not least the final.

SharpshooterTom

You have to understand most people my age think football before the Messi/Ronaldo days are effectively worthless now, certainly any football before the year 2000 would be of no interest to many of them (understandable).

When people say late 80's football is sh1t, with some notable horror European Cup finals (e.g. PSV v Barcelona), that may be the case, but at least by watching them I know I can then have a conversation with (older) football fans and understand and appreciate what football was like back then.

The whole point of watching these whole matches is the learn about the game in different era's, not to enjoy them necessarily. I just like learning about the history of the game.

I grew up in the 70s so have a fondness for watching games from that era,Espn Classic and now BT Sport show The Big Match Revisited regularly,which was ITVs version of Match Of The Day presented by Brian Moore!

brevity

ThomasFlynn wrote: »

My dad (who sadly longer is with us) told me England 1-1 Ireland was a long ball hoof fest, loved the result but told me the game generally was terrible.

What about Holland v Ireland? Jack Charlton's Ireland rarely did 3-3 thrillers.

I was too young to remember any of this, was only 4 a month after the WC finished, but I'm thinking over time of getting perhaps all the 52 full matches, I'm a WC nut and thus incredibly sad enough to undertake this task, like to get Euro's 88 and 92 as well maybe.

That Italia 90 mascot brings back some memories

5starpool

Watch Liverpool vs Notts Forest from the 87/8 8 season. Should be online somewhere I'd expect as the full match was on the season review video that I remember owning years ago. Now THAT was a great performance from that era.

brevity

brevity wrote: »

That Italia 90 mascot brings back some memories

Even by 1990 standards, an era of shiny tracksuits, paisley and tie dye, it was bad.

NIMAN

I remember watching the full video of the Real Madrid v Eintract Frankfurt, the Hampden final. 7-3, often described as the greatest footbakl match ever.

Shows they even did hype back in the day, it's not a modern phenomenon. The game was amazingly slow compared to even games from the 80s, and some of the goals were very easy for Madrid. And iirc the Germans had scored 12 in their semi.

I remember watching Italian football live in the 80s, it was a great standard and very exciting. Each team had a great number of top players, as I think they had the 3 foreigners rule, meaning a good spread of talent which would benefit today's game greatly. The 2 Milan clubs, Juve, genoa, sampdoria, all great teams.

I remember watching some old games on satellite a few years back. One was the west ham Fulham fa cup final. 75 I think. What really stood out was the total respect the players had for the refs, no moaning at him, whatever he said went. Good heavy tackles, all honest and fair. Zero diving, zero appealing for throw-ins you know aren't yours. A better time, football today is a shadow of that when it comes to obeying rules and playacting.

fyfe79

OP, I know where you're coming from - I've looked on ebay recently at those unofficial 'full matches' sets you're talking about. The 1990 WC one is terrifying though - dreadful tournament. I was 11 watching it and it was poor - Ireland were atrocious of course, and Argentina got to the final by kicking everything.

Is there a Euro '88 set? That was a good tournament - Ireland/England/Holland/Russia in one group, and Germany/Italy/Spain/Denmark in the other. Holland with Van Basten and Gullit in their side were awesome. As a result, I followed Milan for years, especially as RTE showed a Monday night highlights package of Serie A every week back in the late 80's/early 90's. Would love to see some videos of those shows actually!