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It Was 58 Footballing Years Ago Today...
July 16, 1950: For some utterly unfathomable reason, this World Cup was decided not by a knock-out final, but by a final group stage. Thankfully for the organisers, the final game did turn out to be the decider, with hosts Brazil expected to beat Uruguay in front of almost 200,000 spectators - the largest ever recorded crowd at a football match. But Uruguay had other ideas and pulled off an upset commonly called Maracanazo. Mercifully, FIFA then abandoned this daft idea ahead of the 1954 finals.
July 16, 1966: England's World Cup campaign gathered some pace with a 2-0 win over Mexico in front of 92,000 at Wembley, with Bobby Charlton and Roger Hunt scoring the goals. At this time there was no place in the side for either Alan Ball or Geoff Hurst, with Terry Paine and Jimmy Greaves in Alf Ramsey's line-up.
Elsewhere in the tournament, Argentina and West Germany played out a 0-0 draw at Villa Park, a Eusebio-inspired Portugal beat Bulgaria 3-0 at Old Trafford and Sunderland played host to a USSR side who beat Italy 1-0.
July 16, 1979: 'Never go back' was the lesson learned by Malcolm Allison after he took control of Manchester City for the second time and ruined his reputation with a series of bizarre decisions, like selling off crowd favourites Peter Barnes and Gary Owen. He left after less than a season.
July 16, 1986: Undoubtedly a bizarre appointment given the arguments for either Billy McNeill or Jim McLean, but the SFA appointed their Technical Director Andy Roxburgh as Scotland boss despite the fact that he had never managed a club side. It certainly went okay though, with Roxburgh leading them to the 1990 World Cup and the 1992 European Chammpionships. He left the job in 1993 and became UEFA's Technical Director a year later.
July 16, 1997: Sir Alex Ferguson appointed Roy Keane as ManYoo captain on a 'trial basis' after the retirement of Eric Cantona. It's fair to say it went okay...
On This Day In Real History...
1935: The very first parking meters go into service in Oklahoma City.
1945: The first atomic bomb is detonated in secret in Los Alamos, New Mexico. Three weeks later Hiroshima and Nagasaki were the targets.
1969: Apollo 11 is launched with Neil Armstrong, Buzz Aldrin and Michael Collins determined to be the first men on the moon.
And At Number One...when Keano was made captain was 'D'You Know What I Mean?' by Oasis.
