Football Reloaded

Welcome back to Football Reloaded. If it happened between January 1st 1990 and December 31st 2010 in the world of football then there's a good chance we'll cover it.  As I'm feeling particularly generous this week I'm giving you an extra slice of football nostalgia and throwing back to the 1995-96 season when a touch of Italian flair landed in the sleepy seaside town of Cleethorpes.  When you remember Football Italia on Channel 4, you can probably be forgiven if the name Ivano Bonetti isn't the first that springs to mind ahead of the likes of Baggio, Baresi, Signori and Vialli but don't let that cloud your judgement. The left-sided midfielder made 18 appearances for Juventus to help The Old Lady win the Serie A title in 1986 before repeating the feat with Sampdoria in 1991 as well as playing in the 1992 European Cup final at Wembley with the Genoa based club.  Traditionally a lower league outfit, Grimsby Town were enjoying possibly their best spell since their 1...

Hello and welcome to Football Reloaded, your home of 90s and 00s football nostalgia.  It's time to start our exciting series as we travel back 25 years to the balmy summer of 1996. Football had popped home, the world transfer record was about to be broken and the rest of the Premier League were wondering just what they had to do to depose Manchester United at the head of the English football table.  Let's take a look at what was going on in August 1996 in the football world as well as remembering the number one hits of the time.  Newcastle United were the main headline grabbers as they smashed the world transfer record to bring local hero Alan Shearer to St. James' Park from Blackburn Rovers in an eye-popping £15 million deal. After his impressive five goal showing for England at Euro 96, a host of Europe's top clubs formed an orderly queue to try and secure the striker's services with Manchester United supposedly the clear favourites. For the second time in his car...

Hello and welcome back to Football Reloaded for another slice of 1990s and 2000s football nostalgia.  We're going for something slightly different for this week's post and taking a look back at some of the attempts to bring football to the big screen that were brought out between 2000 and 2010. Grab your popcorn, put your feet up and join us to remember some footballing films.  There's Only One Jimmy Grimble (2000) Think Billy's Boots for the Pro Evolution Soccer generation, the film tells the tale of a bullied Mancunian schoolboy who harbours dreams of playing for Manchester City but finds his crippling nerves and players unwilling to share the school team spotlight a massive stumbling block.  When he receives a pair of battered old boots from an elderly neighbour that he believes to have once belonged to a City legend, Jimmy's performances improve and his dream of playing at his beloved Maine Road soon becomes a reality.  The film features star turns from Robert C...

Hello and welcome back to Football Reloaded, your new home of football nostalgia from 1990 to 2010.  It's not unusual for former top flight players to find themselves filtering down the divisions as their playing days begin to slow down at the back-end of their respective careers. Peter Beardsley turned out for the likes of (an at the time Second Division) Manchester City, Fulham and Hartlepool United in the late 1990s, Peter Shilton made a handful of appearances for Leyton Orient as he chased down the elusive 1000th career game while Chris Waddle can still be occasionally seen trotting out for Sheffield-based non-league club Hallam from time to time.  Here we have the story of another England legend turning out for a club in the bottom tier of the Football League in 2004.  Despite the team's abject failure at Euro 2004, England supporters were salivating at the prospect of their latest lynchpin, Wayne Rooney, leading the national team to glory for many years to come. In ...

Hello and welcome back to Football Reloaded, your regular look back at classic football from between 1990 and 2010.  Given his connections to arch-rivals Liverpool, Rafael Benitez was probably one of the last people Everton fans would have wanted to replace Carlo Ancelotti in the Goodison Park hotseat. Following the Spaniard's controversial appointment as Toffees boss, Football Reloaded remembers when a similarly unpopular managerial appointment occurred in North London towards the back end of the 1990s.  While many of an Arsenal persuasion will perhaps think of the likes of Arsene Wenger or Herbert Chapman when the question of who the club's greatest ever manager is, there is also an argument that George Graham should be included in that bracket. After arriving from Millwall in 1986, the former Gunners midfielder steered the Highbury outfit to the legendary league title win of 1989 as well as repeating the feat in 1991. Arsenal managed to become the first team to win the Leag...

Hello and welcome to Football Reloaded, your new home of football nostalgia between 1990 and 2010.  After the excitement and hubris of England's stunning 2-0 win over Germany on Wednesday, attention now turns to Saturday's clash with Ukraine in Rome with a path to the final at Wembley clearly mapped out.  With that in mind, let's take a look at some classic clashes between England and the seven other teams still dreaming of winning the Euro 2020 title.  England 1-0 Belgium, June 26th 1990 (World Cup Last 16) The game that gave birth to John Motson's famous soundbite that features in the original version of Three Lions as England did it in the last minute of extra time thanks to David Platt's excellent volleyed goal.  After John Barnes had seen his first half goal disallowed for offside, England were heading towards their first ever penalty shootout (that would of course come later in the tournament..) when Paul Gascoigne clipped a free kick into the Belgian penalty ...