The beautiful game is changing.
While we’re all in favour of football modernising and changing with the times, we also pine for certain things from bygone years.
We’ve decided to be more romantic than a million underdog wins by creating this list of 15 things that you just don’t see in modern football.
Some we miss, others we don’t but they’re all not seen anymore.
1) Teams wearing 1-11 jerseys
Don’t even get us started on defenders like William Gallas wearing the 10 shirt or Lord Bendtner sporting the number 52 but it’s even rarer to see a starting XI whose line-up wears the 1-11 numbers on their back.
A larger squad and designated numbers have put an end to this on club level but it’s also a pretty rare sight in internationals.
2) Black boots
We love seeing new boots here at JOE Towers but any player that’s wearing those classic ‘Puma Kings’ are in the minority now.
We imagine that hard-as-nails defenders from yesteryear must be raging when they see all those pink, orange, green and multi-coloured boots out there.
3) Contested drop-balls
Players are too nice nowadays by sportingly kicking the ball back to their opponents.
We’re kidding of course but there was a certain buzz about seeing two players go in and try to 1) win the ball or 2) snap the ankles off each other.
Here’s Roy Keane and the much missed Gary Speed contesting the ball.
4) Streakers
To quote Swiss Tony from the Fast Show, keep your own clothes on because no one wants to see a man in the nude.
Of course streaking still happens in the modern game but a half-naked man was almost as regular a sight at Lansdowne Road as Jack Charlton’s cap.
5) Managers smoking in public
JOE doesn’t advocate young managers taking up smoking as a way to deal with their nerves but it probably did help at times.
We don’t see Pep Guardiola or Jose Mourinho doing this anytime soon.
Lippi is just cool though. Really cool.
6) Regular jersey sponsors
This writer is still trying to come to terms with the fact that PSV Eindhoven will no longer be sponsored by Phillips. It’s a seismic event.
While modern football is strictly business, there was something reassuring about knowing that Arsenal were always sponsored by JVC, Man Utd had Sharp, Liverpool were Candy or Carlsberg and Everton was NEC.
7) Cynical back-passes
A change that’s definitely for the better but can you imagine Andres Iniesta or Xabi Alonso doing something like this to waste time?
Graeme Souness at his most pragmatic and time-wastingly brilliant here.
8) Woefully O.T.T tackles that you would be sent to prison for
The Wengers and Platinis of this world will have you believe that tackling is a bad thing that needs to be outlawed.
They’re wrong.
This being said, some of the tackles that were accepted as ‘the norm’ in the past were enough to warrant a career ban.
Norman Hunter is about two months late with this challenge.
9) Penalty-box predators
General statement klaxon but modern football has developed to a point where teams can’t accommodate a predatory striker (lazy fecker if you will) whose main area of skill was poaching goals in the 6-yard-box.
The 4-2-3-1 formation has meant that a sole target-man has to be mobile, hard-working and tactically astute.
It’s rare to see a player that rarely leaves the box a la Miroslav Klose, Pippo Inzaghi or Ruud van Nistelrooy.
10) Awful pitches among the ‘big clubs’
The first week in January will always see games in League One, League Two etc be called off but footballers at the ‘top’ clubs get to play on carpets every week (apart from an inexplicably bumpy Anfield this season).
Do you remember a period in the early naughties when Old Trafford looked like there were potatoes growing on it?
It must have been all that rugby league being played.
11) One-club men
Xavi, Maldini, Giggs and Balotelli. Which one stands out?
12) FA Cup final songs
Is this tradition still alive? We can’t remember seeing anything that’s as cringey as this tune.
13) Out and out wingers
Formations should rightfully be changed but I’m not buying the opinion that a 4-4-2 is dead, it’s just evolving as seen by Atletico Madrid’s use of Koke and Arda Turan as auxillary central midfielders when they don’t have the ball.
Football hipster rant over.
This being said, it’s rare to see a right-footed winger solely occupy the right-wing and vice versa for his team mate on the left. Wingers played so wide that they usually had chalk on their boots but it’s not as regular now.
Beat your man, get to the byline and cross it into the box.
Instructions that were given by Alex Ferguson to Kanchelskis in ’94 or from David Moyes to Antonio Valencia in 2014.
14) Some of these accessories
Players throwing slabs of Vicks VapoRub on the jersey like Arsenal did, nose strips ala Robbie Fowler, tie-ups for your sock’s or shin pads or toilet roll being hurled onto the pitch.
You just don’t see them.
15) Absolutely bats*it crazy kits
We imagine that some modern day jersey’s won’t be well received in the annals of time but there’s something wonderfully wacky about seeing some absolutely bonkers kits.
Two words: Jorge Campos.
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