Lee Davy sits down with a select band of World Series of Poker (WSOP) players to uncover their favorite World Cup memories of all time.
The great thing about having the FIFA World Cup at the same time, as the World Series of Poker (WSOP) is it makes busting from the tournaments a little bit easier to swallow.
Consign the beat to the past, seek out a television set and sit and watch the greatest game in the world unfurl before your very eyes.
The FIFA World Cup is right up there with the Olympics as one of the greatest sporting spectacles in the world and with so many different nationalities under one roof, I thought I would take a scraping from them all to uncover their greatest memories.
The first person I spoke to was Sweden’s Martin Jacobson who told me that he hasn’t been able to watch too many games, doesn’t have a favorite player but his favorite memory is from the World Cup in Germany, in 2006, when Henrik Larsson scored in the 90th minute to draw 2-2 with England.
Dermot Blain is a Full Tilt Poker (FTP) sponsored pro and his favorite memory was when Ireland beat Italy in the Giants Stadium. He was only 10 years old at the time and watched the game in a pub in Sligo. He was too small to get a seat so he sat on a bench and when Ray Houghton put the ball into the Italian net the place went ballistic!
Blain’s favorite moment of the 2014 World Cup has been the performance of Arjen Robben. Blain tells me that despite Robben not being the most likeable player he is incredible on the big stage and always seems to deliver.
He thinks it’s hard to pick a winner, because there aren’t a lot of strong teams, but would go for Argentina if he had to choose anyone. They are physically very strong, the climate suits them, and in Messi, Aguero and De Maria they have three of the best forwards in the tournament.
The Belgians have a very strong squad and poker player, tournament director and proud Belgian, Kenny Hallaert, told me that his abiding memory of the World Cup was the murder of Andres Escobar—the Colombian defender who was murdered after scoring an own goal against the USA in 1994, after it was alleged a group of drug dealers lost a lot of money on the result.
Another abiding memory for Hallaert is the Zinedine Zidane headbutt in the final of 2006, his favorite World Cup player is the Belgian goalkeeper Thibaut Courtois and he believes Brazil are still the favorites as the host country but France have impressed him. Hallaert was also fortunate enough to go to visit Brazil a few weeks ago and said he will always remember visiting the legendary Maracana Stadium.
The English pros Stuart Rutter and Matt Ashton also managed to get out to Brazil to watch a few games. Rutter told me that his abiding World Cup memory was the Michael Owen wonder goal against Argentina in 1998, David Beckham’s sending off and our eventual capitulation in the penalty shoot-out.
Rutter was at the incredible Spain v Holland game where the Dutch romped home 5-1 and was waxing lyrical about the goals of van Persie and Robben. His favorite player is Bastian Schweinsteiger and he believes Germany will go on and lift the cup.
Matt Ashton was with Rutter in Brazil and he said his abiding memory was the swarms of different fans he met as he walked to the various stadiums to watch the matches.
He also said that his non-footballing memory of Brazil was how poorly the bars were organized. He told me that in one bar there was over 100 people trying to get served and just a single bar man trying to serve them. He told me that the place eventually ran out of alcohol, but the bar man didn’t seem to care and just started taking videos of the people who were chanting and singing.
His abiding memory outside this event was Zidane’s headbutt in 2006, and this year he likes the Germans a lot, questions Brazil being favorites because of their over reliance on Neymar, and is expecting some fireworks from Messi once the big games come along.
The Colombians have been one of the best teams to watch and James Rodriguez has been one of its stars. Mayu Roca is the number one ranked all-time Colombian money winner and he believes Colombia have what it takes to go all the way.
Roca told me that his abiding memory of all time is the current performance of his national team. Second to that was his actual attendance at the World Cup in France 1998, and his favorite player is a tie between Ozil, Robben and that man James Rodriguez.
The French have surprised many people at this World Cup and so I tracked down Bertrand “ElkY” Grospellier to extract his abiding World Cup memories. ElkY told me that his best World Cup memory was the victory over Brazil in 1998 when they trounced them 3-0 to take the title. He said he doesn’t watch the French national team as much now the likes of Henry and Zidane have retired, but he is still rooting for them to win, despite thinking Argentina will take it. Lionel Messi is his favorite player.
I also found an American who is interested in the World Cup in the shape of Byron Kaverman. One of the most in-form players in the world has been spotted watching the games on his iPad whilst grinding WSOP events.
Kaverman is another player who managed to sneak away from the WSOP to watch a few games in Brazil. He told me that his favorite moment was watching the Spain v Chile game. He said the atmosphere was incredible and it was like a home game for Chile, who used the fans to run all over the World Champions.
His abiding memory is waking up with friends in the middle of the night to watch the games, in past tournaments, and believes that although this tournament has a lot of evenly matched teams, Germany will go on to win after they beat Brazil in the semi final and Holland in the final.
Finally, I am going to leave my two pennies worth.
My first World Cup memory was being woken up by my Uncle in 1982 to watch the France v Germany semi-final, and I remember Harald Schumacher breaking the back of Patrick Battiston and not receiving a yellow card.
The most memorable World Cup moment for me was the 1990 semi-final in Italy where I believed we dominated the Germans only to lose on penalties. I cried for hours and threw bricks at the lamp posts in the street to release my pent up hooligan rage.
I have always said the winner of this World Cup would come from the Americas. History says this is usually the case and the heat and humidity is something else. I said Argentina would win it at the beginning of the tournament, but I would really like Colombia to win it.
My favorite World Cup player of all time was Diego Maradona who single handedly won the 1986 World Cup, even if he cheated against the English in the quarter finals.
Now it’s your turn.
What is your abiding World Cup memory?
