History - On This Day

[Collateral]

30 May

Anniversaries

Slava Metreveli
Date of birth: 30 May 1936 (died 7 January 1998)
National team: Soviet Union
Clubs: FC Spartak Sochi, FC Torpedo Gorky, FC Torpedo Moskva, FC Dinamo Tbilisi

Metreveli was born and raised in Georgia but it was not until after he had been discovered by Torpedo that his talent was recognised both domestically and internationally. An outside right of pace and skill, Metreveli played 48 times for the Soviet Union, scoring eleven goals. At international level he also formed a dangerous wing-to-wing partnership with Mikhail Meschi on the left. Metreveli helped the Soviet Union reach the FIFA World Cup quarter-finals in 1962, the semi-finals in 1966 and win the inaugural European Championship in 1960. He won the Soviet league twice and the Soviet Cup on one occasion.

[Collateral]

31 May

Anniversaries

Antti Niemi
Date of birth: 31 May 1972
National team: Finland
Clubs: HJK Helsinki, FC Kobenhavn, Rangers FC, Charlton Athletic FC (loan), Heart of Midlothian FC, Southampton FC, Fulham FC



Niemi's rise to prominence came quickly following his debut as a goalkeeper with HJK. After winning the Finnish league, Finnish Cup and Finnish League Cup, he was snapped up by Danish outfit København. He subsequently transferred to Rangers, but his spell in Glasgow proved a difficult, and he moved to London to play for Charlton on loan before leaving Ibrox for good in December 1999 to take up custodian duties at Hearts. His performances for the Edinburgh club were recognised by not only the fans, who named him player of the year for the 2000/01 season, but also by Southampton, who signed Niemi in August 2002. He now plays for London side Fulham.

Niemi played his first international against Tunisia on 7 November 1992, and has gone on to win over 60 caps for his country as well as being named Finnish goalkeeper of the year on five occasions.

[Collateral]

1 June

Anniversaries

Vassilios Andreas 'Akis' Zikos
Date of birth: 1 June 1974
National team: Greece
Clubs: Skoda Xanthi FC, AEK Athens FC (twice), AS Monaco FC



After establishing a reputation as one of the best defensive midfield players in Greek football, Akis Zikos moved to France in 2002 and quickly demonstrated that his style and influence could translate abroad. Born in Athens in 1974, he made his debut in the Greek first division for Xanthi at the age of 19 before returning to the capital to play for AEK in a €700,000 switch five years later.

From 1998, he enjoyed four successful years at AEK, helping the club to win the Greek Cup final in 2000 and 2002 before signing a three-year contract with Monaco in the summer of 2002. However, a knee injury caused him to miss the 2003/04 UEFA Champions League final. A regular member of the Greece national squad in the late 1990s, Zikos was often overlooked by Otto Rehhagel and missed out on a place at UEFA EURO 2004™.

[Collateral]

2 June

Anniversaries

Momcilo Vukotic
Date of birth: 2 June 1950
National team: Yugoslavia
Clubs: FK Partizan (as a player), Partizan, Cyprus, FC Farul Constanta, PAOK FC (as head coach)



Creative midfield player Momcilo Vukotic played 752 official matches for FK Partizan, and scored 309 goals, making him the second highest scorer in the club's history. Such was the regard in which he was held, many Partizan supporters only went to matches to see Vukotic play, be it for his dribbling, precise passing and high work rate, or alternatively his ability to assist or score.

Vukotic also found time to spend a period with FC Girondins de Bordeaux, but quickly returned to Belgrade to take up where he left off with Partizan. At national team level, he struggled to gain recognition at a time when Yugoslavia shone on the international stage, winning 28 caps. Following his retirement as a player, Vukotic became involved as a director of Partizan, and during the 1988/89 season he was coach at the club. He was subsequently coach of the Cypriot national team.

[Collateral]

3 June

Anniversaries

Vivian Woodward
Date of birth: 3 June 1879 (died 1954)
National team: England
Clubs: Clacton Seconds FC, Chelmsford FC, Tottenham Hotspur FC, Chelsea FC



Playing football as an amateur at the start of the 20th century while being a qualified architect, Vivian Woodward represented England 23 times in full internationals in addition to the 43 amateur matches in which he participated. His career on the international stage included appearances at the 1908 and 1912 Olympic Games for Great Britain, both of which ended in gold medal successes. He scored eight goals in England's 15-0 victory against France in Paris in 1908, an individual record that to this day has not been matched by any English player.

At club level, he was involved with Clacton and Chelmsford before helping Tottenham gain promotion to the top flight. He then switched to Chelsea for whom he scored 34 goals in 116 matches before the start of the First World War. Woodward received leave from army service to play for Chelsea in the 1915 'Khaki' FA Cup final, but he refused to play because he had not participated in the previous rounds in the competition, sitting in the stands while Chelsea lost. After his playing career ended, he became a Blues director, and both Tottenham and Chelsea were to help him financially later in his life following serious illness.

[Collateral]

4 June

Anniversaries

Giourkas Seitaridis
Date of birth: 4 June 1981
National team: Greece
Clubs: PAS Giannina FC, Panathinaikos FC, FC Porto, FC Dinamo Moskva, Club Atletico de Madrid



A winner at UEFA EURO 2004™, right-back Giourkas Seitaridis played his first game for Greece on 13 February 2002 against Sweden. He played the full 90 minutes of six of Otto Rehhagel's side's EURO 2004™ qualifiers and then played in all six of their games at the finals as Greece pulled off a stunning success.

Born in the Athens port of Piraeus, Seitaridis signed professional terms with PAS Giannina, for whom he played just eight league matches before joining Panathinaikos on a five-year contract in January 2001 as a 19-year-old. Seitaridis made an immediate impact in March of that year with a spectacular 25th-minute goal against Manchester United FC in the UEFA Champions League. He stayed in Portugal after EURO 2004™, joining champions Porto, but his association with the club lasted just one season before he moved to Russia to join Dinamo. In June 2006, he moved on to Atletico in Spain.

[Collateral]

5 June

Anniversaries

Peter Doherty
Date of birth: 5 June 1913 (died 6 April 1990)
National team: Northern Ireland
Clubs: Coleraine FC, Glentoran FC, Blackpool FC, Manchester City FC, Derby County FC, Huddersfield Town AFC, Doncaster Rovers FC (as a player), Bristol City FC, Northern Ireland (as manager)

Doherty began his working life as a bricklayer and a bus conductor, before his footballing talents were spotted by Blackpool after he had begun playing for Coleraine and then Glentoran. With Blackpool, Doherty, a skinny inside-forward, earned the first of his 16 international caps for Northern Ireland. However, bigger challenges at club level beckoned and he was to move to Manchester City, winning a League Championship medal in his first full season and scoring 30 goals in the process.

After serving in the Royal Air Force in World War II, he joined Derby and went on to win the first post-war FA Cup against Charlton. He subsequently played for Huddersfield, and was player-manager at Doncaster before becoming a full-time coach at Bristol City and then Northern Ireland, leading them to the 1958 FIFA World Cup in Sweden. His team would go as far as the quarter-finals of the competition and in the same year, Northern Ireland recorded their first victory against England in 30 years by winning at Wembley.

[Collateral]

6 June

Anniversaries

Wladysław Zmuda
Date of birth: 6 June 1954
National team: Poland
Clubs: Gwardia Warszawa, Slask Wroclaw, Widzew Lodz, Hellas-Verona FC, US Cremonese



Despite a deceptively low profile at the heart of Poland's defence, Żmuda achieved a remarkably consistent FIFA World Cup record. He played in four tournaments, in 1974, 1978, 1982 and 1986, by which time he had played more matches at the finals – 21 – than any other footballer. Żmuda was playing his club football with Gwardia Warszawa when he helped Poland finish third at the 1974 World Cup – a feat they would repeat in 1982.

[Collateral]

7 June

Anniversaries

Kevin Hofland
Date of birth: 7 June 1979
National team: Netherlands
Clubs: SC Fortuna Sittard, PSV Eindhoven, VfL Wolfsburg, Feyenoord



Born in 1979 and a product of the Sittard youth system, Hofland represented the club over three seasons – playing 59 league games – following a momentous debut in which he helped them to a 3-1 victory against Feyenoord. In 2000, PSV beat off competition from several clubs across Europe to sign the defender, winning the title in his first season at the club. While injuries would hamper his domestic and international careers over the following seasons, Hofland picked up plenty of experience in Europe before electing to move to Germany in the summer of 2004 to join Wolfsburg. Internationally he earned his debut for the Netherlands in a 2-1 victory against Spain during his time at PSV but has since struggled to make a mark. Hofland returned to the Eredivisie for the start of the 2007/08 campaign to play for Feyenoord.

[Collateral]

8 June

Anniversaries

Jose Antonio Camacho
Date of birth: 8 June 1955
National team: Spain
Clubs: Real Madrid CF (as a player), Rayo Vallecano, RCD Espanyol, Sevilla FC, Spain (as a player and as a head coach), SL Benfica (twice), Real Madrid CF (as coach)



Originally a combative left-back Camacho rose quickly through the Madrid youth ranks in the mid-1970s and later served club and country in central defence and also at right-back. He was nearly lost to the game through a knee ligament injury in training which cost him a place at the 1978 FIFA World Cup as well as 18 months of his career. But he made a remarkable recovery to win a then-record 81 international caps, and later coached Spain at the 2002 World Cup finals. He has since had two spells at Benfica either side of a stint in charge of Real Madrid.

[Collateral]

9 June

Anniversaries

Miroslav Klose
Date of birth: 9 June 1978
National team: Germany
Clubs: SG Blaubach-Diedelkopf, FC 08 Homburg, 1. FC Kaiserslautern, Werder Bremen, FC Bayern Munchen



Polish-born striker Miroslav Klose came to worldwide attention at the finals of the 2002 FIFA World Cup, scoring five times in Germany's first three games, including a hat-trick in their 8-0 win against Saudi Arabia. Although he failed to score again in the tournament, Klose retained his place as Germany went all the way to the final. However he was a less important figure by the time of Germany's disappointing early exit at UEFA EURO 2004™. Having played for Blaubach-Diedelkopf and Homburg, Klose joined Kaiserslautern in July 1999, working his way up into the first team before joining German champions Bremen in the summer of 2004 and playing his first season of UEFA Champions League football in 2004/05. Klose moved on to Bremen's Bundesliga rivals Bayern for the start of the 2007/08 season where he won the league and German Cup.


Wesley Sneijder
Date of birth: 9 June 1984
National team: Netherlands
Clubs: AFC Ajax, Real Madrid CF



Despite his slight stature, Wesley Sneijder is deceptively strong on the ball and his passing range is enhanced by being ambidextrous. Having joined Ajax as a youngster, then reserve coach, Danny Blind, helped him work on his positional sense before recommending that Ronald Koeman promote him into the first team. His rise was meteoric: within the space of one "crazy week" – as he put it – he played against AC Milan in a 2002/03 UEFA Champions League quarter-final and made his international debut. Sneijder ended his five-season stay with the Amsterdam club in 2007 to join Real Madrid and was a Primera Division winner in his first season.

[Collateral]

10 June

Anniversaries

Ladislao Kubala Stecz
Date of birth: 10 June 1927 (died 17 May 2002)
National team: Czechoslovakia, Hungary and Spain
Clubs: Ferencvarosi TC, Vasas SC, SK Slovan Bratislava, AC Milan, FC Barcelona, RCD Espanyol, FC Zurich, Toronto Falcons



Kubala, a devastating attacking inside-right, is the only player confirmed as having gained international recognition with three countries – winning seven caps for Czechoslovakia, three for Hungary and 19 for Spain. Kubala left Hungary in the late 1940s. In exile in Italy he formed a refugees team called Pro Patria which played exhibition tours and provided him with the chance to impress Barcelona. Kubala was a Spanish champion four times, a Spanish cup winner five times and won the Inter-Cities' Fairs Cup twice with Barcelona, who he left after the 1961 European Champion Clubs' Cup final defeat against SL Benfica.

[Collateral]

11 June

Anniversaries

Sergei Yuran
Date of birth: 11 June 1969
National team: Soviet Union, CIS and Russia
Clubs: FC Zorya Luhansk, FC Dynamo Kyiv, SL Benfica, FC Porto, FC Spartak Moskva (twice), Millwall FC (loan), Fortuna Dusseldorf, VfL Bochum 1848, SK Sturm Graz (as a player), FC Spartak Moskva (as a coach), FC Dinamo Stavropol, SK Ditton (now FC Daugava), FC TVMK Tallinn, FC Shinnik Yaroslav, FC Khimki (as head coach)



Sergei Yuran was a powerful centre-forward who, according to himself, "was used to working in dirt and blood and gave [his] all for a victory". He started his career with his hometown club, Zarya in 1986 where he caught the eye of Dynamo scouts, moving to Ukraine's top club in 1988. Two years later, he helped the Kiev club complete a Soviet league and Cup double before joining Benfica in 1991 and then spending short spells with Porto, Spartak Moskva (twice), Millwall, Fortuna Dusseldorf, Bochum and Sturm Graz, where his career was ended by a serious head injury.

At international level, Yuran was capped 40 times for the Soviet Union, the Commonwealth of Independent States and Russia. He scored seven goals for the various national sides in which he was involved and he took part in EURO '92 and the 1994 FIFA World Cup finals. He has now moved into coaching.

[Collateral]

12 June

Anniversaries

Patrick Anthony 'Pat' Jennings
Date of birth: 12 June 1945
National team: Northern Ireland
Clubs: Newry Town FC, Watford FC, Tottenham Hotspur FC, Arsenal FC



Jennings retired from football in honour as he made his 119th international appearance for Northern Ireland on his 41st birthday in the 1986 FIFA World Cup finals. Only defeat, against Brazil, marred the occasion. By then Jennings had played well over 1,000 senior matches in a 24-year career, four of them FA Cup finals. He was a winner with both Tottenham in 1967 and Arsenal in 1979, losing with the Gunners in the finals of 1978 and 1980. Jennings once scored a goal with a clearance downfield during the 1967 FA Charity Shield against Manchester United FC.


Panagiotis 'Takis' Fyssas
Date of birth: 12 June 1973
National team: Greece
Clubs: Panionios GS (now Panionios NFC), Panathinaikos FC (twice), SL Benfica, Heart of Midlothian FC



An uncompromising left-back, Fyssas has enjoyed a successful last few years, winning UEFA EURO 2004™ with Greece and then staying in Lisbon to win the Portuguese title with Benfica. Playing in all six of Greece's games in Portugal, Fyssas started his career with Panionios, making his senior debut in the 1990/91 season. He had been with the club for nine seasons when he moved, aged 25, to Panathinaikos. A seasoned European campaigner, he joined Benfica in the summer of 2004 before moving on to Edinburgh side Hearts for the 2005/06 season where he has made over 50 appearances in two seasons. He rejoined Panathinaikos for the start of the 2007/08 campaign.

[Collateral]

13 June

Anniversaries

Rinat Dasaev
Date of birth: 13 June 1957
National team: Soviet Union
Clubs: FC Spartak Moskva, Sevilla FC



Dasaev was rated as on of the world's top goalkeepers at the end of the 1980s. Born in Astrakhan, he helped the Soviet Union win bronze at the 1980 Olympics in Moscow and was voted domestic footballer of the year two years later. With only two goals conceded he was the top goalkeeper in the 1982 FIFA World Cup qualifiers and enhanced his reputation in Spain in the finals and then again in Mexico four years later and Italy in 1990. Dasaev made his Spartak debut comparatively late at the age of 22 but his senior international debut just four months later, against East Germany.