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Showing posts with label England National Team. Show all posts
Showing posts with label England National Team. Show all posts

Tuesday, February 12, 2019

#Legend. #Icon. #Trailblazer. #Gentleman. #WorldCup Class all the way. #GordonBanks. R.I.P. #England's #1. And I saw him play when he was GK for NASL's #FortLauderdaleStrikers in 1970's, too.




#Legend. #Icon. #Trailblazer. #Gentleman. Not to mention, hard-working and encouraging.
But above all else, modest and self-effacing.
All over England and the soccer world today, generations of people and football fans are thinking of the talent, personality and work ethic of Gordon Best on news of his passing, and thanking him for being what he was. Himself. Unique.
(And the man who helped give England what it had never had before in the World Cup but desperately craved -dignity and bragging rights!)
And by because of how Gordon Banks played, conducted himself and interacted with people, for a whole generation of people, he set the gold standard by which to measure all other athletes, on and off the pitch, playing field or arena.
#Class.

I first saw Gordon Banks play in-person, years later after his World Cup history-making saves with the NASL's Fort Lauderdale Strikers at Lockhart Stadium in 1977, where my best friends and soccer teammates went to Striker games several times a month, and year after year, having more fun there then just about anywhere we went at a time when both the Dolphins and Hurricane football teams were mediocre, though I still went to all of their games, too, of course.
Even the rides to the Strikers games in Fort Lauderdale via 1-95 in North Miami Beach were fun, where we'd go in a caravan of 5-6 cars if it was a big game against the hated Tampa Bay Rowdies or star-filled New York Cosmos, but just 2-3 cars if it was against a lesser team.
And, sometimes, on good days and nights, we'd have our friends from the elite NMB High School girls gymnastics team -of whom I was the manager of- come along with us to the games.
That always made things even more fun, because we had a lot of fun-loving girls on that team back then, some of whom even dated my friends on the NMB soccer team, back when we were one of the top teams in Florida, having won the 1976 state high school championship.
Of course, you also had to think about what kind of music the driver preferred, too.
How much food could be consumed by a car full of high school kids before we made it to the stadium parking lot 20 miles away? As it turn out, quite a LOT!
So many great memories!




I had followed the team there from the Orange Bowl in Little Havana, where I had regularly watched them as their predecssor, the Miami Toros (Gatos)  from 1972 thru 1976. I was there the day they lost the 1974 NASL championship at home to the Los Angeles Aztecs in overtime. 
I was able to go so frequently, despite living in North Miami Beach near the 163rd street Shopping Center- because my family had several season tickets on the north side of the Orange Bowl, right near the middle of the field, courtesy of my mother's employer.
The benefits to Junior High School age me were obvious from the start, as my Mom or Dad were always taking me and my two sisters, and as I got older and was playing soccer myself, bring my best friends and teammates if my sisters were not into it, which they usually were not.
Sometimes, my friends and I even brought girls as dates, too!
I even saw their game down at Tropical Park against Pele, where my late father and I sat in bleacher seats that, to me at least, seemed like they could not possibly have been inspected as thoroughly as we expected or wanted!
https://thenewtropic.com/miami-soccer-history/
https://www.si.com/vault/1975/06/16/606647/the-pied-piper-of-miami












Stoke and Leicester City legend Gordon Banks dies aged 81 | ITV News, https://youtu.be/pGTuezZWmMs



















Remembering Gordon Banks: England’s 1966 World Cup-Winning Goalkeeper, https://youtu.be/1EpYZXSqO8g























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