Friday, 12 October 2012

Football Memories - EURO 1980



Hosts Italy provide the bulk of the defence and winners West Germany an attack led by Horst Hrubesch in a 1980 UEFA European Championship select XI dominated by two sides.

GK: Dino Zoff (Italy) 
Twelve years after winning the UEFA European Championship on home soil, Zoff was still in goal for the hosts in 1980. Although Italy failed to reach the final this time, Zoff did not concede a goal until a long-range missile from Czechoslovakia's Ladislav Jurkemík in the third-place play-off. Two years later, aged 40, he would make history by captaining the Azzurri to FIFA World Cup victory in Spain, becoming the oldest winner in the process. The Juventus custodian, whose 11-year spell at the Turin club ended with defeat against Hamburger SV in the 1983 European Champion Clubs' Cup final, won 112 caps and later moved into coaching, leading Italy to runners-up spot at UEFA EURO 2000.

DF: Claudio Gentile (Italy) 
An uncompromising defender who shackled Diego Maradona and Zico at the 1982 World Cup, Gentile warmed up for that triumphant tournament by helping Italy to clean sheets in all three group games at the 1980 UEFA European Championship. He snuffed out the threat of Ballon d'Or holder Kevin Keegan, among others. From 1973-84 Gentile, who for all his physical play was never sent off, made 283 Serie A appearances for Juventus and won six Serie A titles. Capped 71 times, he coached the Azzurrini to glory at the 2004 UEFA European Under-21 Championship.

DF: Gaetano Scirea (Italy) 
A peerless defender of calm authority, Scirea was as brilliant for Italy at the 1980 UEFA European Championship as he would be two years later helping the Azzurri triumph at the 1982 World Cup. An ever-present in both tournaments, his classy, elegant displays in the libero role recalled the great Franz Beckenbauer. Scirea, who ended his international career after winning his 78th cap in 1986 at his third World Cup, won all three major European club trophies plus seven Serie A titles during a 14-year career at Juventus. Tragically, he was killed in a car crash in Poland aged 36, while on a scouting mission for the Bianconeri.

DF: Karlheinz Förster (West Germany)
The younger of two brothers in West Germany's winning squad, Karlheinz outshone sibling Bernd throughout a career that brought recognition as one of the world's most irrepressible central defenders. Aged 21, Förster neutralised Belgian dangerman Jan Ceulemans in the 1980 final to round off an exceptional championship. He accumulated 81 international caps, twice finishing a World Cup runner-up. A Bundesliga champion with VfB Stuttgart in 1984, Förster left for Olympique de Marseille in 1986 and retired in style after winning the French double in 1990.

DF: Hans-Peter Briegel (West Germany) 
The 1980 UEFA European Championship was the coming-of-age of this former decathlete, who went on to amass 72 caps and finish runner-up in two World Cup finals. Briegel played every game of the 1980 tournament and was badly missed after going off injured in the second half of the final. He would return to Italy four years later, when, after a decade at local club 1. FC Kaiserslautern, he helped Hellas-Verona FC win the Scudetto and became the first foreign-based player to be voted German Footballer of the Year. Briegel coached the Albania national team from December 2002 to May 2006.

MF: Marco Tardelli (Italy) 
The abiding image of Tardelli is his wild-eyed, head-shaking celebration after scoring Italy's second goal in their 1982 World Cup final victory. That was not the first big goal the dynamic midfielder had scored for the Azzurri, however. Two years earlier he plundered Italy's only goal in the UEFA European Championship group stage – the late winner that defeated England 1-0. It came on Tardelli's home ground, Turin's Stadio Comunale, where he spent a decade winning silverware for Juventus, including the 1985 European Champion Clubs' Cup, before moving to FC Internazionale Milano. He later coached Inter and Italy Under-21s, and is now Republic of Ireland coach Giovanni Trapattoni's No2.

MF: Jan Ceulemans (Belgium) 
Ceulemans won a national record 96 caps between 1977 and 1990, scoring 23 goals. An attacking midfielder who could also play as a conventional striker, he filled the latter role at the 1980 UEFA European Championship and his muscular play caused problems for every defender he faced bar West Germany's Karlheinz Förster, who got the better of him in the final. Ceulemans scored one goal at the finals, against England, but was Belgium's standout performer throughout the group stage. Although the 1984 tournament was a disappointment, the Club Brugge KV stalwart played in three World Cups, memorably captaining Belgium to the semi-finals in 1986.

MF: Bernd Schuster (West Germany)
This prodigious 20-year-old played only two of West Germany's four matches in 1980, against the Netherlands and Belgium, but the dazzling blond midfielder shone in both. Schuster's exploits secured a move from 1. FC Köln to FC Barcelona and second place in the European Footballer of the Year poll. This was the only major international tournament in which he played, injury ruling him out of the 1982 World Cup before he retired from the international game at 24. Schuster won the 1985 Spanish title with Barcelona and clinched two championships at Real Madrid CF, where he briefly returned as coach in July 2007 after leading Getafe CF into Europe.

MF: Hansi Müller (West Germany)
An elegant midfield playmaker with a sweet left foot, Müller was the rising star of the Bundesliga with VfB Stuttgart when he went to the 1980 European finals, aged 22. He had had a brief taste of action at the 1978 World Cup and fulfilled his potential at the tournament in Italy, starting all four games and decorating the team's play with his clever passing. EURO '80 would be Müller's international peak; he disappointed at the 1982 World Cup, and, after a stint at FC Internazionale Milano, won his 42nd and final cap the following year. An Indian summer to his career ensued with FC Tirol Innsbruck, and he was an ambassador for the city at UEFA EURO 2008.

FW: Karl-Heinz Rummenigge (West Germany) 
Rummenigge went into the 1980 UEFA European Championship with a big reputation having topped the Bundesliga scoring charts with 26 goals to win the title with FC Bayern München. He lived up to it, punctuating a series of powerful performances with the decisive goal against Czechoslovakia and providing the corner for Horst Hrubesch's late winner in the final. Rummenigge was voted 1980 European Footballer of the Year and retained the Ballon d'Or in 1981 after another top-scoring, title-winning campaign with Bayern. He scored 45 goals in 95 internationals, the last of which came in the 1986 World Cup final and is now a senior football executive at Bayern.

FW: Horst Hrubesch (West Germany) 
West Germany's match-winner in the 1980 UEFA European Championship final against Belgium, Hrubesch scored twice in Rome, his second goal a trademark bullet header in the 89th minute. It was a day of glorious redemption for the Hamburger SV forward who only weeks earlier had hobbled around the Santiago Bernabéu with an ankle injury as his side lost the European Cup final to Nottingham Forest FC. A latecomer to the international scene, the 'The Heading Monster' was only called up after Klaus Fischer broke his leg, and would win just 21 caps. A three-time Bundesliga champion, he captained Hamburg to European Cup success against Juventus in 1983.


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