July 4, 1926: The birth of perhaps the greatest player ever to be capped by three different countries. Alfredo di Stefano represented Argentina, Columbia and Spain in his time, but he will be remembered as the man who was the fulcrum of the Real Madrid side that won the first five European Cups alongside Ferenc Puskas and Gento.
If di Stefano was around today, the transfer saga that took him to Real Madrid would have made Cristiano Ronaldo's look like a page ten story. Some Barcelona fans are still sore about this particular episode, after di Stefano signed a contract with them after leaving Colombian side Millionarios. However, he mysteriously joined Real a few weeks later, amid rumours of interference from the Spanish government, and more specifically Madrid fan General Franco.
July 4, 1974: Boy, did this not go well. It was on this day 34 years ago that Don Revie was appointed England manager, after guiding Leeds to two league titles, an FA Cup and two Fairs Cups (that's the UEFA Cup to you whipper-snappers). Unfortunately, things did not go quite as well with the national side. His methods that had brought great success at Leeds were not taken seriously with England, and by the summer of 1977 they were on the way to World Cup qualification failure, leaving Revie convinced that he was about to be sacked.
Getting his retaliation in early, he resigned to take a lucrative gig as manager of the United Arab Emirates national side, but not before selling his story to The Daily Mail. As it turned out, readers of the Mail found out before the FA did, as Revie's letter of resignation arrived after FA HQ closed for the night. Revie was banned from English football for ten years, a ban he subsequently overturned in the High Court.
July 4, 1990: The day when England's hate-hate relationship with penalty shoot-outs began, and also the day when we learned even the hardest men cry. After drawing 1-1 with West Germany in the World Cup semi-final in Turin, it came down to spot-kicks to decide who would face Argentina in the final. Not before Paul Gascoigne had an on-pitch breakdown after getting himself booked, thus missing the next match. He's not the hard-man referred to earlier, we'd like to stress.
A nation cursed as the now famous English lack of bottle emerged, with Stuart Pearce only finding Bodo Illgner's legs (then somewhat ruining his 'Psycho' image by blubbing his brains out) and Chris Waddle launching the ball so high that it is rumoured to still be rising. Since then, England have won just one competitive shoot-out, against Spain in Euro 96.
On This Day In Real History
1776: Some country or other over the sea declares indepedence from Blighty, which they've been banging on about ever since.
1948: The National Health Service is established in Britain.
1997: The unmanned American space probe 'Pathfinder' lands on Mars.
And At Number One... when Stuart and Chris were mucking up their penalties was 'Sacrifice' by Elton John.