Authors: Gordon Banks
The pressure on Alf to leave Nobby Stiles out of the side for the Argentina game gathered momentum. Some FA officials thought Nobby’s robust style would only serve further to inflame the team that had already received a warning from FIFA about their conduct. Alf, however, resisted all calls to drop Nobby. ‘If Stiles has to go, then so do I,’ Alf told the FA, and meant it. The last thing the FA wanted was the England manager walking out before a World Cup quarter-final. Needless to say, the anti-Stiles brigade quickly backed off. Once again, Alf had shown that, irrespective of the outcome of the Argentina game, he would not be dictated to regarding team selection.
‘Alf’s gone out on a limb over you,’ our assistant trainer, Les Cocker, told Nobby. ‘Don’t let him down!’
The idea that 4–3–3 was a new formation that revolutionized British football and sounded the death knell for wingers is only
partly true. In fact, 4–3–3 was nothing new, though it was new to England as an international team. The 4–3–3 formation, with midfield players, or half backs, fulfilling roles in both defence and attack as well as the middle of the park in preference to orthodox wingers, whose prime job was one of attack, had been applied with some success in Italy. 4–3–3 was a variation of both the old ‘W’ formation, in which a team played with two full backs, three half backs and five forwards, and the 4–4–2 system Alf had preferred in previous England matches.
In Italy the 4–3–3 formation had been deployed with considerable success by both AC Milan and Internazionale. The Italians referred to 4–3–3 as
catenaccio
, which in English means ‘door bolt’ or ‘chain’. The Italians played 4–3–3 as a very defensive and cautious system, with which teams denied opponents scoring opportunities by defending the ‘scoring space’ and adopting man-to-man marking, supported by a sweeper. Italian teams such as Inter-Milan, under the coaching of Helenio Herrera, relied heavily on counterattacks spearheaded by speedy strikers. 4–3–3 paid handsome dividends for Inter when they won the European Cup in 1964 and 1965. Though 4–3–3 brought success, the way Inter played resulted in some very sterile football. Once one of their counterattacks had produced a goal, irrespective of how early in the game their goal had been scored, Inter shut up shop, fell back into defence, and relied on their
catenaccio
system to stifle all the efforts of their opponents to equalize.
The origins of 4–3–3 can be traced way back to the 1930s when Switzerland, managed by the Austrian Karl Rappan, used the
verrou
system (
verrou
also means ‘door bolt’). The pre-war Swiss side adopted a rudimentary sweeper in defence and relied on breakaway attacks to score goals. This system was truly innovatory back then. Though bereft of world-class players, Switzerland made an impact in the 1938 World Cup in France, beating a powerful German team 4–2, only to go out at the hands of the beaten finalists, Hungary. Before that tournament in 1938 Switzerland had employed the
verrou
system in their 2–1 victory
over England in Zurich. As Stanley Matthews, who played in that match, recalled in his autobiography,
The Way It Was
:
The Swiss were content to fall back and rely on defence, where they played a roaming defender between their back line and their goalkeeper… I had never come across such a system before. We tore into the Swiss, but they were up to everything we threw at them. They beat England 2–1, with both the Swiss goals coming from swift counterattacks, one of which resulted in a very dubious penalty. We camped out in and around the Swiss penalty area but try as we did, the equalizing goal remained elusive. Switzerland’s football hadn’t been pretty, but from their point of view, their new style of play proved highly effective.
The Italian sides of the early sixties perfected the Swiss
verrou
system and Alf was to develop 4–3–3 even further. He wanted us to be more adventurous than the Italians. Rather than simply falling back to defend a one-goal lead and remain in our shell, Alf wanted us to play the ball quickly out of defence to Alan Ball or Martin Peters, who in turn would hit early balls in for Geoff Hurst.
‘We shall not rely on defence. We will still take the game to the opposition,’ said Alf.
The work rate of Bally and Martin Peters was to play a vital role in the success of the 4–3–3 system. Both worked immensely hard to help out in defence and fulfil their role as wide midfield players. If Alan played the ball in from the right, Martin would be there to support Geoff Hurst and Roger Hunt in attack. Conversely, when Martin crossed the ball from the left, Alan would be buzzing about the penalty area looking to pick up any pieces. As I have said, both Martin Peters and Alan Ball were very intelligent players. Martin had great vision and a very cultured left foot while Alan was blessed with electrifying speed and great tenacity. Possibly their most valuable assets were their lungs, which must have been like sides of beef, so much ground did they cover.
Alf didn’t need to spend countless hours with a blackboard explaining the 4–3–3 system to the players. Although we hadn’t played it as a team, we all had a good grasp of how it worked, for we had all come across 4–3–3 in some form or other when playing against continental teams. Alf only had to talk us through the system to convey the finer points of how we would deploy it.
Alf conducted his team talks in the afternoon. At the Bank of England training ground at Roehampton we would train in the morning, break for lunch, then gather in the conference room for one of Alf’s talks. After a hard training session, lunch was very welcome.
The first day we had lunch at Roehampton, everyone was delighted with the quality of food on offer. The menu consisted of tomato soup as a starter, a main course of a sumptuous side of beef, enormous Yorkshire puddings (as Ray Wilson remarked, ‘This chef’s idea of a balanced meal is Yorkshire pudding on your dinner plate, and one on your side plate’) and all the trimmings, followed by a pudding, or sweet (as I still called it) of a delicious homemade apple pie with creamy custard. Everyone was in agreement that this was first-class cuisine. The only problem was, this menu never changed. By the seventh consecutive day our appetite for this sumptuous carvery was wearing thin and we would have given a king’s ransom for beans on toast or a salad. I can only assume that roast beef and apple pie was the only meal that the chef at the Bank of England training ground could make. For chef’s special, read chef’s only.
After lunch Alf allowed us half an hour to relax before calling us to a team meeting in the conference room. On those July days the sun streamed through the large plate-glass windows and, following such a large lunch, a number of players struggled to keep awake. Jimmy Greaves introduced an added element of excitement to Alf’s team talks by running a book on how long Jack Charlton could stay awake. The stopwatch was started as
soon as Alf began to speak, and stopped the moment big Jack’s eyes closed and his chin dropped on to his chest.
Alf’s words of wisdom fell upon deaf ears as the attention of half the squad focused on big Jack. I won a few bob, as did Bobby Moore, Ray Wilson, George Eastham and, of course, Jimmy himself. On one occasion Alf was midway through a long talk about Portugal when Jack momentarily nodded off, only to sit bolt upright again when startled by one of his snores. Jimmy Greaves immediately blurted out, ‘All bets are off!’ much to the bewilderment of the boss. Needless to say, Alf soon twigged, and Jimmy’s involuntary interruption of Alf’s team talk put the kybosh on that little entertainment.
On 23 July, the day of the quarter-finals, the sun shone, the attendances were good and the explosions came.
The first excitement came at Goodison Park, where North Korea rocked world football on its heels by racing into a three-goal lead against Portugal. Goodison giggled in disbelief. The waves of incredulity wafted back to every television and radio as the nation struggled to come to terms with what was the most amazing scoreline of the World Cup. Surely North Korea couldn’t maintain this sort of form, especially against the much-fancied Portuguese? They couldn’t. Eusebio took the game by the scruff of the neck and, slowly but surely, Portugal eroded North Korea’s early advantage. At half time it was 3–2, and in the second half the doughty North Koreans felt the full force of the brilliance of Eusebio. Bent on absolute destruction he tore into the North Korean defence. Come the final whistle, Portugal were winners by five goals to three. Eusebio helped himself to four goals, with the fifth coming from Augusto.
Just by reaching the quarter-finals and giving Portugal one almighty shock, North Korea had achieved more than they could have ever hoped for when setting out from their homeland. In coming back to win the game from three goals down, Portugal
had shown themselves to be as sound in character and temperament as in technique. As for Eusebio, his virtuoso performance saw him elevate himself to a status in world football that hitherto had been the sole preserve of Pelé.
While the drama of Goodison was unfolding, we were involved in drama of a very different kind in our game against Argentina. It was an afternoon when the passions, the ruthlessness and the national pride that had been grafted on to the pursuit of the World Cup surfaced in both majestic and disgraceful ostentation.
The game was only minutes old when Alan Ball was cynically felled by Silvio Marzolini. The referee, Rudolf Kreitlein of West Germany, took no action except to award a free kick. The tone of the match had been set.
We took the game to Argentina, a signal for the body-checking and cynical fouls to gather momentum as the Argentines resorted to all manner of thuggery to keep us at bay. We had what I thought were legitimate appeals for penalties turned down following fouls on Alan Ball and Geoff Hurst as we continued our onslaught on the Argentine goal. Herr Kreitlein was rapidly filling his notebook with Argentinian names and ten minutes before half time decided that the ‘unofficial referee’, the Argentine skipper, Antonio Rattin, who had disputed every booking, had to go.
Herr Kreitlein was a small and dapper man whose somewhat irritatingly authoritative manner served only to further the displeasure of the Argentinians, and of Rattin in particular. Every time the referee penalized the South Americans, the volatile Rattin ran up to him, pointing imperiously, his gestures indicating sheer contempt for the official. Having committed a series of fouls Rattin was called over by Kreitlein. The Argentinian skipper gazed down at the referee as if he had a bad smell under his nose. Herr Kreitlein spoke only a few words before Rattin spat forth a volley of invective at his face. It was the last straw for the German,
who turned to the team benches and raised his right arm to indicate that Rattin had to go.
That’s when the real trouble started. Rattin refused to accept this decision. Kreitlein repeated his arm movement. Rattin shrugged his shoulders, gesticulated with his hands to indicate he didn’t understand why he had been sent off and stood his ground. The game was held up for seven minutes as chaos reigned. I stood dumbfounded on the edge of my penalty box as I watched a heated argument develop between the match officials, the players, the Argentinian management and FIFA delegates. At one point the South American players left the pitch en masse, as if to suggest that it was a case of ‘one off, all off’.
The Argentinians furiously argued with the referee’s liaison officer, Ken Aston, and Harry Cavan, the FIFA match delegate. At one point two police officers came on to the scene, probably worried that should matters escalate even further, they might have a problem of public order to deal with. Indeed, by this time the Wembley crowd were getting very agitated, catcalls and boos raining down from the terraces. On the touchline there was much pushing and shoving as the police officers struggled to keep the tempestuous Argentinians and the beleaguered FIFA officials apart. Eventually Ken Aston and Harry Cavan managed to convince the Argentina manager, Juan Carlos Lorenzo, and his delegation of fellow countrymen that Herr Kreitlein’s decision was irreversible. Rattin was off.
Well, off the pitch at any rate. The match resumed with Rattin hurling insults from the sidelines. At this point drama degenerated into farce as Argentine players fell to the ground like bags of hammers every time one of our players came near them. Once on the ground they writhed around like electrocuted earthworms. It was pantomime stuff but no one was laughing. Least of all Bobby Moore, who resisted the temptation to restore parity of numbers by not retaliating to a slap in the face from Alberto Gonzalez. Bobby’s composure in the face of such extreme provocation was
exemplary, but no more than we had come to expect from our captain.
The breakthrough we had been labouring for eventually happened thirteen minutes from time. From wide on the left wing, Martin Peters crossed the ball into a space between the Argentine goalkeeper Antonio Roma and his defence. Geoff Hurst timed his run to perfection. He ghosted into the space, leapt like a stag and, with a deft flick of his head, guided the ball past the static Roma and into the net. The Wembley terraces exploded into a heaving mass of colour and noise. Hats were hurled, arms held aloft, as 90,000 people celebrated what was to be the winning goal.
Geoff’s goal had its origins more at Upton Park than the England training pitches at Roehampton. I had seen the West Ham wingers cross the ball like that many times. Martin Peters was very adept at floating the ball into the danger area between a goalkeeper and his back line, and there was no one better than Geoff at getting on the end of such a cross. So a tactic that evolved on the Hammers’ training ground won the game for England. In such a tight game we needed players capable of producing a moment of true inspiration to catch the opposition off guard. Fortunately, on this day, England had such players in Martin and Geoff.
Our joy at winning a place in the semi-finals was tempered by Argentinian bitterness. When the final whistle blew, all the tempestuous emotion of a team who believed they could have won the World Cup was once again unleashed on the referee, who had to be escorted from the pitch by Ken Aston and a small posse of the Metropolitan’s finest.