Yesterday I mentioned how I have surprisingly limited memories of the 1986 World Cup. Today I went through all the results and there are many, many matches in the first round that I never remember happening. You may think this is surprising as it was a long time ago and there are a lot of matches at a World Cup. But then you forget that I remember details about a particular save or a shot cleared off the line from specific matches over the years.
This blip must be because of the time difference. The 1982 and 1990 editions were both in Europe so there was no reason not to watch it all. Still, one of my favourite matches of all time happened in 1986: Brazil-France. And then there was the Gary Lineker match. I had stayed up very late one night to watch England play Morocco. It was a terrible 0-0 draw, with the most significant event being Bryan Robson dislocating his shoulder again. England had lost their first match to Portugal which left them needing a win by three goals against Poland in their last group match. The irony is that I have a good memory of the 3-0 England win but I didn't watch it. I remember hearing car horns as I fell asleep, which in Malta means that either England or Italy won. And the next day I heard about the Lineker hat-trick. Gary Lineker had made it at the World Cup and all of a sudden England looked good.
In the last sixteen they brushed Paraguay aside, 3-0. And now I was really dreaming. Next was Maradona and the hand of God goal, followed by the goal of the football god.
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