© „Reuters“
The history of the most popular sport in the world is unbelievable. More than two centuries have passed since football was created and during this time, immeasurable meters were covered. Most football fans know such past events as Diego Maradona's handball goal or the Hillsborough tragedy, during which 96 people died in a match between Nottingham Forest and Liverpool in 1989 when a stand collapsed. However, like any historical thing, football has had many strange and funny incidents during its existence, which make you shake your head in disbelief. The most popular football portal in the country, EuroFootball.com, continues to tell incredible football stories. You can read the first part here, and the second part here. Blow the whistle, it's over!
In 1960, something unexpected happened in the Danish football league. Norager hosted the Ebeltoft footballers in their field, who due to an embarrassing misunderstanding had to admit the opponents' advantage. At the end of the match, the hosts were leading 4:3, and the visitors rushed to the final attack. However, the match referee, Henning Erikstrup, decided to stop the attack and declare Norager as the winner. But an unexpected problem arose - the referee couldn't blow the whistle because he lost his dentures while trying to do so. Erikstrup searched for his false teeth, and meanwhile, Ebeltoft equalized the match. So, 4:4, right? However, it didn't seem that way to the referee... Finally finding his dentures, Erikstrup did not count the goal and ended the match, giving the victory to the hosts. Ebeltoft immediately protested after the match and filed a complaint with the Danish Football Association, but it was rejected. Therefore, the final result was 4:3 in favor of Norager.
The real hat-trick. Many players have scored a hat-trick (three goals in a match) during their careers, but no one can boast of what the former West Ham player and England national team defender Alvin Martin did. On April 21, 1986, West Ham defeated Newcastle United 8:1, and A. Martin scored an incredible hat-trick - against three different goalkeepers. The defender scored his first goal against Martin Thomas, then, after Thomas got injured, he was replaced by Chris Hedworth, against whom the West Ham player also scored. At the end of the match, when the forward Peter Beardsley entered the field, Martin scored his third goal, recording an incredible achievement. According to the BBC, no other footballer has done that.
Competition also. Probably only a very small part of football fans are interested in the league of the Scilly Isles, which is the smallest in the world. Only two teams compete in the championship - Garrison Gunners and Woolpack Wanderers, who play each weekend. The season starts in mid-November and ends at the end of March. The teams play 17 matches, and the champions are the team that simply wins more times. However, it doesn't end there - the unpredictable season starts with the Charity Shield match, and as the championship progresses, a two-match system competes for the Wholesalers and Foredeck trophies. So, it can be summarized that the only time these teams do not play against each other in the league is when they compete in cup matches, but... once again, one against the other.
A great deal. In the winter of 1998, an unusual deal happened when the transfer window opened. The second Romanian league club Petroșani "Jiul" transferred the rights of the goalkeeper Ion Radu to the "Valcea" team, but it did not do it for money. The footballer playing in the middle of the field was sold for 500 kilograms of pork, which was valued at about 1750 pounds at that time. The president of the Jiul club stated that the meat would be sold, and the money received would be used to pay the players' salaries. For comparison, the transfer of the world's most expensive footballer Neymar from Barcelona to Paris Saint Germain cost about 58 million kilograms of pork or 1.26 million pigs.
Own goal, anyone? The league of Madagascar is another championship that you probably don't show interest in. All you need to know is that on October 31, 2002, in Antananarivo, "AS Adema" defeated "Olympique de L'Emyrne" 149:0, without scoring a single goal themselves. Two weeks before the end of the championship, "Olympique de L'Emyrne" played a draw 2:2 with "DSA", although they led 2:1 and then conceded a questionable penalty kick. These draws canceled all the chances for the so-called SOE team to triumph in the championship, so they decided to protest in the next matches by scoring own goals. Spectators observing the match claim that the Olympique de L'Emyrne players simply kicked the ball back towards their own goal and let it roll in. After the match, the Madagascar Football Federation suspended 4 players until the end of the season, and all other players on the field received strict warnings for their involvement in such an incident. However, the losing coach was the luckiest - he was suspended for only three years. The result of all this was that this event was engraved in the annals of football not only as one of the silliest protests but also as the biggest defeat in the history of the world's most popular sport.
