Group C.
10.06.90 (21.00) Turin, Stadio Delle Alpi
BRA – SWE 2:1 (1:0)
(+62000) Lanese ITA, Jonini TUN, Vautrot FRA
BRA: Taffarel – Jorginho, Ricardo Gomes (c), Branco, Mozer – Mauro Galvão,
Dunga, Alemão, Valdo (88 Silas) – Careca, Müller
SWE: Ravelli – R.Nilsson (c), Larsson, Ljung (70 Strömberg), Schwarz –
Ingesson, Limpar, J.Nilsson, Thern – Brolin, Magnusson (46 Pettersson)
1:0 Careca 40, 2:0 Careca 63, 2:1 Brolin 79
booked: Mozer, Branco, Dunga / J.Nilsson
11.06.90 (17.00) Genoa, Stadio Luigi Ferraris
COS – SCO 1:0 (0:0)
(-31000) Loustau ARG, Jacome ECU, Mactet FRA
COS: Conejo – Flores (c), Gonzalez, Montero, Chavez – Chavarria, Ramirez,
Gómez, Cayasso – Marchena, C.Jara (87 Medford)
SCO: Leighton – Gough (46 McKimmie), McLeish, McPherson, Malpas – Aitken (c),
McStay, Bett (74 McCoist), McCall – Johnston, McInally
1:0 Cayasso 49
16.06.90 (17.00) Turin, Stadio Delle Alpi
BRA – COS 1:0 (1:0)
(+58000)
Jouini TUN, Mandi BHR, Diramba GAB
BRA: Taffarel – Jorginho, Ricardo Gomes (c), Branco, Mozer – Mauro Galvão,
Dunga, Alemão, Valdo (87 Silas) – Careca (84 Bebeto), Müller
COS: Conejo – Flores (c), Gonzalez, Montero, Chavez – Chavarria, Ramirez,
Gómez, Cayasso (78 Guimaráes) – Marchena, C.Jara (71 Myers)
1:0 Müller 33
booked: Jorginho, Mozer / C.Jara, Gómez
16.06.90 (21.00) Genoa, Stadio Luigi Ferraris
SCO – SWE 2:1 (1:0)
(-32000) Maciel PAR, Listkiewicz POL, Mauro USA
SCO: Leighton – Levein, MacLeod, McLeish, McPherson – Malpas, Aitken (c),
Durie (76 McStay), McCall – Johnston, Fleck (85 McCoist)
SWE: Ravelli – R.Nilsson, Larsson (76 Strömberg), Hysen (c), Schwarz –
Ingesson, Limpar, J.Nilsson, Thern – Brolin, Pettersson (53 Ekström)
1:0 McCall 10, 2:0 Johnston 80 p, 2:1 Strömberg 86
booked: McPherson / Thern
20.06.90 (21.00) Genoa, Stadio Luigi Ferraris
COS – SWE 2:1 (0:1)
(~30233) Petrović JUG, Courtney ENG, Snoddy NIR
COS: Conejo – Flores (c), González, Montero, Chavez – Chavarria
(76 Guimaráes), Ramirez, Gómez (60 Medford), Cayasso – Marchena, C.Jara
SWE: Ravelli – R.Nilsson, Larsson, Hysen (c) – Schwarz, Strömberg
(83 Enqvist), Ingesson, J.Nilsson, Pettersson – Brolin (34 Gren), Ekström
0:1 Ekström 32, 1:1 Flores 75 h, 2:1 Medford 88
booked: Gómez, Marchena / Strömberg, Schwarz
20.06.90 (21.00) Turin, Stadio Delle Alpi
BRA – SCO 1:0 (0:0)
(+62000) Kohl AUT, Kirschen GER, Listkiewicz POL
BRA: Taffarel – Jorginho, Ricardo Gomes (c), Branco, Ricardo Rocha – Mauro
Galvão, Dunga, Alemão, Valdo – Careca, Romario (66 Müller)
SCO: Leighton – McKimmie, MacLeod (39 Gillespie), McLeish, McPherson –
Malpas, Aitken (c), McStay, McCall – Johnston, McCoist (79 Fleck)
1:0 Müller 82
booked: Johnston, McLeod
1. BRA^ 3 3 0 0 6 4-1
2. COS^ 3 2 0 1 4 3-2
3. SCO 3 1 0 2 2 2-3
4. SWE 3 0 0 3 0 3-6
As expected, Brazil won the group. They won all games and compared to other teams played quite well, yet… not just at home the team was criticized and rightly so. The match against Costa Rica was particularly alarming: the outsider was pretty much equal to to mighty Brazil. Brazil struggled in all group games. Costa Rica was a big surprise – journalists practically laughed at the optimistic words of Bora Milutinovic at first, but his team played competent football, making life difficult even for Brazil. The debutantes already achieved more than hoping for and nobody laughed at Milutinovic any more, when cautiously he said that who knows, his may go even beyond the next round. Scotland missed the boat as usual… the game against Costa Rica was largely blamed for the failure: the team seemingly underestimated the outsiders. After that… it was too late. Scotland fought well and went home early, as usual. Sweden lost all their games and ended last, but it is difficult to consider them a big failure – true, the team considered by many the best ever Swedish selection was unable to get even one point, but it played quite well. May be unlucky… there were some players which made good impression. At least back at home nobody was going crazy over the early exit and even the coach was not fired.
Against Sweden – Top, left to right: Cláudio André Mergen ‘Taffarel’, Mauro Geraldo Galvão, ‘Ricardo’ Raimundo Gomes , José Carlos Nepomuceno ‘Mozer’, Jorge de Amorim Campos ‘Jorginho’ , Cláudio Ibrahim Vaz Leal ‘Branco’ , Bottom, left to right: Luís Antônio Corrêa da Costa ‘Müller’, Ricardo Rogério de Brito ‘Alemão’, Antônio de Oliveira Filho ‘Careca’ , Carlos Caetano Bledorn Verri ‘Dunga’, ’Valdo’
Head coach: Sebastião Lazaroni
Head coach: Olle Nordin
Against Sweden: Top, left to right: Maurice Daniel Robert Malpas, Craig William Levein, James Leighton, David McPherson, Alexander McLeish, Bottom, left to right: Andrew Stuart Murray ‘Stuart’ McCall, Robert Sime ‘Roy’ Aitken, Gordon Scott Durie, Murdo Davidson MacLeod , Maurice Johnston, Robert William Fleck
Head coach: Andy Roxburgh
Head coach: Bora Milutinović
08.06.90 (18.00) Milano, Stadio Giuseppe Meazza (San Siro)
09.06.90 (17.00) Bari, Stadio San Nicola
13.06.90 (21.00) Napoli, Stadio San Paolo
18.06.90 (21.00) Napoli, Stadio San Paolo
USSR vs Argentina – crouching from left: O. Kuznetzov, A. Zygmantovich, I. Dobrovolsky, A. Zavarov, O. Protassov. Standing: A. Uvarov, V. Bessonov, S. Aleynikov, V. Khidiatullin, S. Gorlukovich, I. Shalimov.
Head coach: Carlos Bilardo
Sitting from left: M. Nassibov – masseur, A. Zavarov, V. Ratz, S. Myshalov – doctor, N. Simonyan – team chief, V. Lobanovsky – coach, Yu. Morozov – assistant coach, I. Yaremchuk, I. Dobrovolsky, V. Lyuty, V. Bessonov. Second row: O. Sokolov – masseur, R. Dassaev, S. Gorlukovich, I. Shalimov, O. Kuznetzov, V. Chanov, A. Zygmantovich, A. Borodyuk, V. Broshin. Top row: A. Uvarov, V. Khidiatullin, S. Aleynikov, O. Protassov, A. Tzveyba, G. Litovchenko, A. Demyanenko, S. Fokin.
Head coach: Valeriy Lobanovskyi
Head coach: Emerich Jenei
Head coach: Valeri Nepomniachi
ITA: Zenga – F.Baresi, Bergomi (c), Ferri, Maldini – Ancelotti (46 de Agostini),
CZE: Stejskal – Straka, Kadlec, Kocian, Hašek (c) – Kubik, Bilek, Chovanec,
ITA: Zenga – F.Baresi, Bergomi (c), Ferri, Maldini – Berti, de Napoli, Giannini,
CZE: Stejskal – Kadlec, Kocian, Hašek (c), Kubik – Bilek, Chovanec (32
ITA: Zenga – F.Baresi, Bergomi (c), Ferri, Maldini – Berti, de Napoli
AUT: Lindenberger – Pfeffer, Pecl, Aigner, Streiter – Artner, Ogris,
3. AUT 3 1 0 2 2 2-3
4. USA 3 0 0 3 0 2-8
Head coach: Azeglio Vicini
Head coach: Jozef Vengloš
Standing from left: Hörtnagl, Polster, Aigner, Pecl, Schöttel and Rodax.
Head coach: Josef Hickersberger
Head coach: Bob Gansler
Modern football came to the point of looking as badly constructed robot with easily replaceable, but equally unimpressive parts, a cheap toy of mass production, which is outrageously priced. The name ‘Ciao’ was also symbolic – it means both ‘hello’ and ‘goodbye’: hello to the crowning event of football to say bitter goodbye to the game.
Perhaps it will be best to recall a betting agency rather than more ‘professional’ views: this is how Germans ranked the teams in betting terms. Hardly more different that ‘official’ ranking and ‘professional’ predictions/expectations. It will be good to see how close the betting ranking came to actual results. This quotation did not differ much from what was expected by specialists and pundits… Perhaps the most important thing was how England and Spain was seen: no matter what was hoped at home, objectively nobody thought these two teams capable of winning the World Cup. Strong – yes, winners – no. Also run. That was the reality in 1990.
The all-time World Cup table was going to change. What else?
Even the official poster of the finals was reminding a coffin. During the 1980s problems piled up, most of them voiced out, but not addressed – the sport was into fundamental crisis. From aging and increasingly dangerous stadiums to fan violence, which spread like the plague from country to country. By now a football match was really like a war – an invasion of merciless army of fans destroying everything they met on the road to the stadium. Win or lose, the carnage was always present. It was not better on the pitch, where tactical fouls, hunting of the best players of the opposition, vicious tackles, physical battle, time wasting, simulations, and constant complaining of every call of the referees were not just elements of the game, but became the game itself. Referees were no better – their too many mistakes were no longer viewed as mistakes, but deliberately done ‘against us’ and the referee, never really liked, now was considered entirely incompetent, but ill-minded devil. Coaches behaved in a way, which only fueled the fire: jumping, gesticulation, screaming, protesting and abusing the referees every time they blew the whistle. Their ’emotions’ were calculated to increase the tensions and succeeded. A football match was no longer fun and joy, but mean and dangerous event, in which only victory counted, no matter how achieved. Violence ruled the game and everything surrounding it. And by the end of the 1980s something else was evident: a leveling of players and teams. Yes, it was great to see many lowly teams, particularly those from Africa and Asia, improve and coming close to the traditional football leaders, but the traditional powers were not getting better – they were getting worse. Everybody was playing the same kind of football, with the same tactics, it was difficult to distinguish one team from another . The players were also becoming generally the same, similar robots just from the assembly line of mass production. The 1990 World Cup just illuminated all the ills of the game – it was the dullest World Cup finals ever, the final match was simply a shame, leaving the bitter taste in viewers of three hours entirely wasted. Football was dying and the only way to bring it back to some kind of life was by radical surgery. Thus, rules had to be changed and an era of constant changing of rules started. Yet, one key element, perhaps the most important one for the ills of the game, was increased in importance: money. Big money. In 1990 ‘classic’ football expired. Something different was born. Something artificial. Something like a sick patient kept alive only by constant medical intervention, plugged in machines and mechanisms – unplug them and the patient will collapse dead immediately. What started in 1990 was the road on which a player with fantastic salary is terribly injured before even the season started and is constantly complaining of ‘unhappiness’. 1990 was the dead end.