“That goal? Surely not. Many forget that Maradona didn’t take one off after his dazzling heroics and choice words from the English in ‘86. In between the quarterfinal of legend against England and final against West Germany, there was a semifinal against Belgium. Sure, Belgium has scraped through twice by the very skin of their teeth and Maradona’s Argentina was Maradona’s Argentina, but one doesn’t make a World Cup semifinal entirely undeserved. (We know, England.)” (World Cup Blog)

“This week’s Video Of The Week takes us back forty years to one of the greatest matches in the history of the competition – the semi-final match between Brazil and Uruguay from Guadalajara in 1970. In some respects, this was the match that started to cement reputation of this Brazil team as the greatest of all time. They had blown hot and cold in their previous matches, outstanding against Peru and Czechoslovakia but less than inspired against England and Romania, but set up against their South American rivals with a place in the final at the Azteca Stadium against Italy at stake, the watching audience finally got to see the very, very best of the Brazilians, and against top class opposition. There was a crowd of over 50,000 at the Estadio Jalisco to watch it and your commentary team are ITV’s Gerald Sinstadt and Bobby Moore. As the match is from YouTube, it is divided into ten minute sections, as ever.” (twohundredpercent)

1970: The definitive World Cup…
“Which is your World Cup? One of my pet theories is that we all have a mundial that, as it unfolds, feels less like a football tournament than a rite of passage, introducing us to idols, emotions and intrigue we will remember for the rest of our lives. Mine was 1970. I was nine then.” (FourFourTwo)

“The Cold War spread insiduously into every aspect of life between the end of the second world war and the end of the 1980s, and sport was no exception to this rule, whether it was the Soviets and Americans boycotting each others’ Olympic Games or Bobby Fischer facing off against Boris Spassky at chess in Rekjavik in 1972. Football was no exception to this rule, and perhaps the definitive meeting of captialism and communism on the football pitch came at the 1974 World Cup finals, when West Germany played East Germany in the group stage of the competition.” (twohundredpercent)

“In the build-up to the FA Cup Final today between Portsmouth and Chelsea, I thought it’d be interesting to enter the time machine and to go back to 1992 to watch the first ten minutes of the television broadcast of Portsmouth versus Liverpool in the FA Cup Semi-Final from Arsenal’s Highbury Stadium.” (EPL Talk)

Ferenc Puskas
“From the mighty Magyars to Maradona’s Argentina side of 1990, here are half a dozen great teams that failed to go all the way” (Guardian)

“The upcoming World Cup will the first to take place in the entire continent of Africa but there are several countries that have already held the tournament more that once, such as Italy, France and Germany. The first team to earn the honour of hosting the World Cup finals twice, however, was Mexico and the story of how this came to pass is as much a story of the politics of FIFA as it is of the qualities of Mexico when it comes to hosting the finals of the tournament. The truth of the matter is that the hosts of the 1986 World Cup finals should have been Colombia.” (twohundredpercent)

“In case you’ve missed the series of articles, Soccernet has been delving into the history of the World Cup with some great lists it calls First XI. Take a look.” (ESPN)