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Why I Love...The Big Match Revisited

A football in front of a goal
  • Posted at 5:50pm
  • 24 February 2009
  • by JackSeale-RT
  • 3 comments

The Big Match Revisited is merely a re-run of ITV's equivalent of Match of the Day from 30 years ago, shoved into ITV4's schedule as cheap archive filler. But it's an irresistible deluge of cute nostalgia, thrilling sport and charming unintentional comedy.

Assuming you can't remember 1979, the season we're currently reliving, you can enjoy games without knowing who wins - and savour a kind of football so different to today's that it could be from a foreign country where fancy dribbling is frowned on, cynical fouls and diving are rare, and organised defending is banned outright. It's a straightforward, gutsy game played by leathery men with moustaches and sausage-y thighs.

Take Ipswich v Leyton Orient, a cracking cup tie in which Orient's midfield is marshalled by Ralph Coates, who looks at least 45 and has an 18-inch comb-over that flaps down from the wrong side of his head as he runs. Another tie, Nottingham Forest (featuring Martin O'Neill and his amazing handlebar eyebrows) v York City, takes place after a heavy snowfall: the groundsman has run a roller over it to create, essentially, an ice rink. The teams just use the light orange ball and get on with it.

In 1979, clubs are still more or less just clubs, not sinister multinational corporations. Players' shirts are adorned only with a number, not adverts for yet more sinister multinational corporations. But there's still fine football: that Forest side are nimble, neat and ruthless (I've already tipped them to win the European Cup), and the Orient game was classic cup heroism from a lower-league side. The other week saw Spurs destroyed in dashing fashion by Manchester City's wide men, Peter Barnes and Mick Channon.

Brian Moore is both host and commentator, and regularly upstages the actual football. He has the genial, gibbering lack of insight that still earns you a six-figure salary as a TV summariser. He really shines between games, reading out viewers' letters complete with full home addresses: "Mrs RC Horne, of 9 Poplar House, Langley, Berkshire, remembers seeing Ted Drake play many years ago. During the kick-in before the game, Ted kicked the ball smack into her face. She says, 'He was so upset, especially as I was a woman. He came to see me at half-time, and again after the match. What a gentleman.'"

Last year - when, oddly, it was 1983 - we were told Sheffield Wednesday had had a "fierce training session on Hampstead Heath" on the morning of their FA Cup semi-final against Brighton & Hove Albion, but then left two of their starting 11 at the hotel "by mistake". They arrived later in a taxi and were, according to Moore, "none too pleased".

We also saw Manchester United boss Ron Atkinson in the studio, drinking champagne as he analysed his latest victory, accompanied by still photographs of the action. Stills are always used during news reports, giving the eerie impression that the players in question have died, rather than just having been suspended for next Saturday's trip to Luton.

None of this could happen now - and that's what makes The Big Match Revisited unmissable.

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Comments

  • Posted on 25 June 2009
  • at 4:05pm
  • by Gordon

Great stuff! We're convinced that today's Prem.League is so much better than it was then. Pitches, skills, foreign talent. The truth is that these were the great days of football.

  • Posted on 14 May 2009
  • at 8:56am
  • by Iain Cameron

The Big Match revisited is fantastic. It seems more like 50 years ago than 30. No sponsors, no diving, pitches like muddy playing fields - brilliant!

  • Posted on 01 April 2009
  • at 5:35pm
  • by benet

brilliant stuff.

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