Teams from a bunch of countries kick around a dumb ball for a whole boring month. Did we see any games?
Nope. Too busy watching C-SPAN.
Is it better than the last World Cup?
There was another one?
Apparently, we also have a team.
World Cup Crazies
Every four years, the planet’s biggest sporting event turns athletes, fans, and entire governments into violent psychotics. What fun.
You think Tyson’s ear-biting incident was wacko? You think Sprewell went a wee bit over the edge? Pal, they both might as well have been taking pottery classes compared to what happens during the World Cup. Americans, of course, could give a rat’s ass about soccer, but the rest of Earth’s population takes this whole Cup business extremely seriously…more seriously than we take the Bill of Rights. And lucky you: It’s on TV the whole damn month. A brief history of World Cup mayhem:
Goaled to Death
For Colombia, the 1994 tournament got off to a shaky start when Francisco Maturana, the team’s coach, began receiving death threats from fans seeking changes in the starting lineup. The excitement began in earnest, though, when the underdog U.S. team defeated the heavily favored Colombian squad, leading to their elimination from the competition. Back home, the Colombian players were roundly abused by pissed-off fans, but none more so than Andres Escobar, who had mistakenly kicked the ball into his own net, giving the U.S. the go-ahead goal. Three men approached Escobar in a parking lot and, according to newspaper reports, said, “Thanks for the goal.”
Then they casually drew their guns and killed him, shouting, “Goal! Goal!” as each bullet hit home.
Post-Game Pardon
Mexico is known for its passionate soccer fans, but in 1970, when the country hosted the World Cup finals, they went completely loco. One example: After Mexico beat Belgium 1-0, Augusto Mariaga, the warden of a Mexican maximum-security prison, ran around the compound, shooting his pistol in the air and shouting, “Viva Mexico!” Then, delirious with joy, he unlocked every last cell and freed 142 dangerous criminals.
Self-Inflicted Victory
The year was 1989. The place, Rio de Janeiro. The teams, Brazil and Chile. It was a hard-fought, take-no-prisoners match, and with the hometown Brazilian squad up 1-0, the crowd was going berserk. At one point a fan threw a flare onto the field, and Chile’s goalkeeper, Roberto Rojas, suddenly collapsed. After lying prostrate on the grass for several minutes, Rojas was gingerly stretchered off the field, covered in blood. His teammates refused to continue the game in such a dangerous atmosphere and walked off the field; Brazil won, but Chile claimed the moral high ground. Unfortunately for the Chilean squad, an investigation revealed that the flare had actually missed Rojas. In fact, he’d been left quite unhurt by it; he had deliberately cut himself with a scalpel he’d hidden in his clothing. The cheating keeper was banned for life, while Chile was fined $31,000 and booted from the 1994 World Cup.
Beaten…And Then Beaten
In 1974, underdog Haiti battled valiantly against the mighty Italian team in a preliminary match. They lost 3-1 but were hailed as heroes — for about 24 hours. They’d barely stopped rejoicing over their performance when the Haitian defender Ernst Jean-Joseph failed a drug test. Asthma medication, he protested. Not exactly, said the team’s doctor. Rather than appeal the test results, embarrassed Haitian officials decided that the best way to restore national pride was to kidnap Jean-Joseph, beat him senseless, throw him in a car, and hustle him onto the next flight back to Haiti.
The Grain-for-Goals Program
To reach the finals in 1978, Argentina had to beat Peru by four goals. This appeared impossible, because a) Peru had a solid team and b) four-point Cup victories are about as common as 40-0 Super Bowls. But the generals who ruled Argentina at the time believed that a World Cup win was the only way they could hold on to their political power. So they hatched a plan: Knowing that the Peruvian government was short of cash, the generals ordered the Argentine central bank to unfreeze $50 million for Peru and had 35,000 tons of free grain shipped to Lima. The subsequent soccer result? Argentina edged out Peru by a score of 6-0.
Royal Reaming
With only minutes remaining in their 1982 match, France was crushing Kuwait 3-0. The French were just about to add a fourth goal when the Kuwaiti defenders stopped in their tracks. The ball sailed into the net, the ref scored the goal, and the crowd went wild. The Kuwaiti players protested that they’d stopped playing because they’d heard a whistle blown by somebody in the crowd. The Russian ref held his ground: The goal counted. But then, up in the stands, Kuwait’s prince, Sheikh Fahad Al-Ahmad Al-Jaber Al-Sabah, stood up and waved his players off the field. The sheikh marched down to the field in his billowing pink robes and commanded the referee to nullify the goal. And without argument, the official obeyed.
World (Cup) War III
How do you treat players from a visiting team? If you were a Salvadoran fan at the 1969 World Cup qualifying match, you hurled rotten eggs and dead rats at them. The hometown crowd was unruly during the game, and even a decisive 3-0 victory for El Salvador did little to restore calm. The Honduran team was whisked from the stadium in armored cars and flown home to safety. “We’re awfully lucky that we lost,” said Honduras’ coach, Mario Griffin, ecstatic that he and his players had managed to escape El Salvador alive. Which is more than could be said for the visiting Honduran fans: Salvadorans set some 150 of their cars on fire; then, as the Hondurans fled for the border on foot, Salvadoran fans kicked and beat them without mercy. Even the Salvadoran government got into the act: The next evening, El Salvador’s army dropped a bomb on the Honduran capital, then sent ground troops across the border. The conflict lasted 100 hours and left an estimated 6,000 dead.
From Teammate to Inmate
In the months leading up to the 1970 Cup, a newspaper in Mexico, the host country, had billed the English squad as “a team of thieves and drunks.” So few were surprised when England’s team captain was arrested en route to the finals for stealing jewelry. While staying in Bogotá, Bobby Moore and a teammate visited their hotel’s jewelry shop. Shortly after leaving the store, the two players were approached and asked to explain the disappearance of a bracelet. Moore was put under house arrest. Following delicate diplomatic intervention, he was bailed out in time to play in the finals; the charges were eventually dropped. Unbeknown to the English players, accusing visiting celebrities of theft was a longstanding Colombian pastime.
Trophy Trauma - Somebody call the cops! The World Cup’s been stolen! Again.
It’s only fitting that a game which has inspired so much bribery, larceny, and murder should have a trophy with a few adventures of its own.
March 20, 1966:
Just three months before the World Cup is set to start in England, the trophy — made of solid gold, with a base of semiprecious stones, and valued at $47,000 — is snatched from its display in London. The ransom note demands £15,000 (about $40,000) in small bills.
March 23, 1966:
A Scotland Yard detective delivers a briefcase with phony bills to a middleman. Fooled, the middleman drives off to retrieve the Cup. But when he notices a police tail, he shrewdly hurls himself out of the moving car and is arrested within seconds. The middleman, Edward Betchley, refuses to identify the heist’s mastermind — known to this day only as “the Pole” — or disclose the trophy’s whereabouts. League officials remain in a panic over the missing Cup.
March 26, 1966:
While out for a walk with his master, a mutt named Pickles sniffs at a bundle of newspapers. It turns out to be the Cup. Pickles is crowned a hero, receiving a year’s supply of dog food as well as the Canine Defense League’s coveted medal. Pickles goes on to hit the big screen, appearing with two bulldogs in the classic film The Spy With a Cold Nose.
1968:
To insure the Cup’s safety, England’s Football Association secretly replaces it with a gilded bronze replica. Millions of players, fans, and foreign dignitaries fawn over a trophy that is completely bogus.
June 21, 1970:
Brazil is permanently awarded the real Cup for winning the competition three times. Taking no chances, they display it in an armor-plated, bulletproof, steel-lined case that’s built into a wall at the Brazilian Soccer Federation.
December 19, 1983:
Two men enter the Brazilian Soccer Federation building, tie up the guard, and extricate the Cup from its armor-plated, bulletproof, steel-lined case.
December 22, 1983:
The Brazilian Football Association generously offers a $1,050 reward for the prized trophy. It’s never recovered.
Today:
For its troubles, the team that wins the World Cup finals receives a gold-plated replica of the original trophy, worth less than $4,000. Thanks all the same, but we’ll keep the Stanley Cup. — Deirdre O’Scannlain
