RIP Garry Shandling.
Awful news, this. I liked It’s Garry Shandling’s Show but I absolutely adored The Larry Sanders Show. We still watch it very regularly here at casa.caress as an easy bit of comfort telly.
You can flip now.
RIP Johan Cruyff
One of the worlds greatest footballers. He had great success as a player and manager just a shame he didn’t win the World Cup with the wonderful Netherlands total football team from the 70’s.
Hendrik Johannes “Johan” Cruyff
Of course I’ve never seen him playing, but I do know a few things about football, and there was one football before, Cruyff and one after him.
RIP to a legend
British actress Adrienne Corri died March 13, 2016 at the age of 85. Born Adrienne Riccoboni on November 13, 1930 in Edinburgh, Scotland, Cori appeared in a number of film roles, and is probably best known for playing Mrs. Alexander in the 1971 Stanley Kubrick film “A Clockwork Orange”. She played Lara’s mother in David Lean’s 1965 film “Dr. Zhivago” and appeared in the Otto Preminger thriller “Bunny Lake is Missing”. Her lone Euro-western appearance was as Pegeen O’Brien/Daisy in 1961’s “Dynamite Jack” starring Fernandel.
I guess that’s true. There have been many great players, but only few were really incomparable (Pele, Maradona, Di Stefano, Cruyff, Beckenbauer). I’m not sure he was individually the most skilfull (I think Maradona was the better technician), but he’s the one who had the biggest influence on how the game is played. He - not Rinus Michels - invented ‘totall football’, the kind of game in which every player became a forward, midfielder and defender within the team. He first introduced it to Europe with Ajax, and won three consecutive European Cups with the team ('71, '72, '73) then to the world with Oranje. And he’s also the one who paved the way for the world domination of Barcelona. Pep Guardiola, the world’s biggest coach at this moment, is his biggest fan. A true footbal genius.
RIP Johan
Yes, he was one of the greatest ever. It’s a pity he did not win too the EC or the WC (only not on 74), it would have been deserved for him and for the team.
He didn’t play on the World Cup '78. That was a relatively weak World Cup (unlike the '74 World Cup that had at least three top teams: Holland, Germany and Poland) and I’m pretty sure Holland would’ve won the final against Argentina (even if the game was played in Buenos Aires) if Cruyff would have played. Without him, we were still one of the strongest teams of the tournament, but not strong enough to crush the Argentines on their home soil.
And with the referees on their side.
That too, but that’s usually the case as far as the home team is concerned. The worst thing that happened during the tournament, was the 6-0 win over Peru. It was later found out that the Argentine Footbal Association had ‘bought’ the result (they needed a 5-0 to reach the final, otherwise Brazil would have played Holland). The Argentine captain Passarella - who is a good friend of several Dutch players who played the final - later said that he - and a couple of others - wanted to give his champion’s medal under those circumstances to the Dutch players, but the Dutch players refused. Willy van de Kerkhoff said: We lost the final and that’s it, the Argentine players didn’t have anything to do with this whole corruption thing.
Anyway, Holland should’ve won that tournement, and they would have, with Cruyff. As said it was a relatively weak tounament: Germany had a mediocre team (without all the stars from '74), Poland was by no means the team from four years before and Brazil (who probably deserved to play the final) wasn’t as strong as they usually were (but stronger than they were a couple of years ago).
The first World cup I have memory of watching, i even did de stickers collection.
Don’t know if it’s true but read that Cruyff didn’t play that world cup, becuase of political reasons, he didn’t wanted to be seen with the Argentine generals that ruled the country back then
No, the reason was an incidident - or a series of incidents - that happened prior to the World Cup Final of '74.
Bild Zeitung (a tabloid) published an article on a wild party in and around the swimming pool of the Dutch hotel. The Dutch Football Association called it psychological warfare in a press conference and most people in Holland believed them, and accused the Germans of foul play before the game. But some player’s wives were alarmed, among them Danni Cruyff: she wanted her husband to come home immediately. Cruyff stayed in Germany, after he had promised his wife that this would be his last World Cup (he kept his word and did not play in Argentina four years later).
Cruyff never showed any real interest in politics as far as I know. Maybe in Catalunya, but not in Holland (or on international level). He was a businessman and wanted to be paid, and paid real well, for his services, but after he had lost nearly all his money with bad speculations, he hired professionals to look after his money. I don’t remember any political statement made by him.
I also read that he did not play in Argentina because of the dictatorship there. Actually after the military putsch it was a scandal for the Fifa to stay with the tournament in Argentina anyway. But well, it was the Fifa wasn’t it?
Another story is that he refused to play for Real, despite they offered him more money, and chose instead Barcelona, because Real was him too close to Franco. But then, he still played in Spain, a then still fascistic state.
The German WC players Netzer and Breitner, who had then the image of rebels, played for Real. Even if their rebel image was much exaggerated, this was a bit surprising.
He wanted to play for Barcelona all his life. I don’t know where these stories come from.
There were actions organized by left-wing artists (Freek de Jonge and Bram Vermeulen) to prevent Holland from taking part in the tournament, and maybe they are the source for these rumors. Cruyff had said in 1974 that he would never play on a World Cup again and he kept his promise.
There was only one player who showed any interest in what De Jonge & Vermeulen were saying about Argentina: Oeki Hoekema, himself a left-wing activist. Hoekema refused to go to Argentina, but it was very doubtful if the national coaches, Happel & Zwartkruis would have selected him: he had only played once for Holland, in 1971 (!).
Unlike Breitner and Netzer, Cruyff never had a rebel image. he had long hair, but most young men in Holland of his age had long hair back then. He wasn’t a hippy either, in fact he was a real family man: he married at young age and his father-in-law helped him with contracts, etc. There were a few other players who actually had a hippy or rebel image, notably Johnny Rep and Ruud Krol. Both were good-looking, not married and very popular with the ladies, but their rebel image was also exaggerated. The only player from the team who really was out of the ordinary, was Wim Suurbier: he was in fact a philanderer and a half-bohemian. Last thing I heard about him is that he lost all his money and became homeless: none of football friends wanted to have him under his roof because he cannot be trusted (with anything)
Both stories can be find easily in several books and newspapers. Old and newer ones.
There is also this story about an attempted kidnapping in 1977: After 30 years, the truth behind Cruyff's World Cup absence | Johan Cruyff | The Guardian
Actually I think if Germany had played with Beckenbauer and some more players (Breitner, Grabowski, Stielicke, Müller), who did not play for several reasons, they could have won in Argentina too.
As you said it was not the strongest competition.
But then, we don’t know how it would have really went when the alleged great or better players had participated, cause it often comes different then expected. The team has to play together as a unit.
In 1976 the Netherlands failed to win the EC with Cruyff, they did not even reach the final. A surprise then.
I too.
It’s only rumours, he revealed the real reason in 2008:
Stanton ahead of me by a couple of minutes! 
Yeah, story of your life … 
Don’t be too ambitious, Deputy… 
Czechoslovakia won he 76 tournament I check it out (only five at the time), I guess the Panenka penalty must come from that period.