In 1953 the great Hungarian team outclassed England in winning 6-3 at Wembley.
Note Kenneth Wolstenholme's reaction to this piece of skill from Puskás:
"My goodness, if he can turn on tricks like this we ought to have him on the music hall."Fast forward 62 years and here is Phil Neville reacting to a piece of skill from Tomas Rosicky:
“If that was a training session and somebody did that I’d be first over there and I’d probably look to two-foot him or take him out of the game.
“If somebody did that in training to me, winding me up, I would be straight in there. I’d smash them.”The idea that there is something funny, unmanly or unsporting about displaying skills at football lives on. Its persistence must surely be one reason that the England teams so often disappoints in major tournaments.
2 comments:
Putting aside the offensive nature of Phil Neville's remarks....
Isn't this problem much wider than football? How many Brits are losing out in the jobs market to immigrants with better education and skills than they themselves have? And how many of those same Brits understand the need for commitment to improving their own skills in order to fill the jobs in the UK which need to be done?
Re Puskas:
Did you know that he came from a German family - part of the "Danube Schwabs"?
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ferenc_Pusk%C3%A1s
His father changed the family's name from Purczeld to Puskas before WW2 when Hungarian nationalism was at a height - before Admiral Horthy became friendly with Hitler ...
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