Wednesday, October 07, 2009

Jairzinho for Brazil (v Zaire), 22 June 1974

Cheer Up Alan Shearer's Top 10 TV Football Moments

3. Ilunga Mwepu

No disrespect to the intelligent, knowledgeable CUAS readership here, but I bet there's hardly any of you who know who Ilunga Mwepu is.

In the 1970s he played his club football for TP Mazembe and he now lives in Malta, where he is an assistant coach in the Adelaide Cini Championship with Girgenti Athletic.

Still no idea?

Right. Well, the clip we've chosen was selected at #17 in a Channel Four poll of the "All Time Best World Cup Moments" (quite how it was so lowly when it's our favourite World Cup moment, I am not sure).

If I were to say that he played right-back for Zaire in the 1974 World Cup, would that make things clearer?

Yes, he's that fella.

Brazil were awarded a free-kick about thirty yards from goal in their 1974 World Cup group match. Having ordered the defensive wall, the referee blew the whistle so the Brazilians could take the kick, but on hearing the whistle Ilunga came steaming out of the wall and lashed the ball down the other end of the field. To say it was a rather basic ignorance of the law would be an understatement, and his bemusement at receiving a yellow card only underlined how little he must have known about the rules.

Brazil went on to win the match 3-0, but Ilunga's genius will live forever.

I *love* this clip.

1 comment:

Adem said...

Once you said he was rightback for Zaire then I instantly knew who he was. Classic.