Today I'm going back 27 years to 10th July 1994. Yes it's another day where I've runout of programmes relating to the game in question and so instead I hope you'll enjoy seeing a selection of my World Cup 1994 ticket stubs. I bought my tickets via the English FA long before the tournament started and my game attended on this date (the Game 48 ticket pictured) was a Quarter-Final that ended up being Romania against Sweden.
You may recall that our 1994 World Cup odyssey involved three matches on the East Coast and now we had moved to the West Coast for the final four matches. As stated on the tickets, this game was played at Stanford Stadium, near San Francisco before we moved on to Los Angeles for the final three games. As was the case for the Foxboro Stadium and Boston, we discovered that the Stanford Stadium wasn't particularly close to downtown San Francisco, it being around 35 miles away! I guess that the creative naming of the match locations subsequently enabled the executives concerned to get jobs negotiating landing slots for Easyjet and Ryanair!
San Francisco is probably my favourite city in the USA. Due to it's coastal location it has a relatively temperate climate. It definitely has what I would call a "West Coast Vibe" where people seem to be a little more relaxed and differences are tolerated in a way that is less true elsewhere. We rode the famous streetcars, visited the crookedest street in the world and managed a trip to Alcatraz where Rita even managed to charm one of the former inmates who was making a living telling his story and selling his book.
Please don't ever tell me that the USA is not a good place to hold a football (soccer) tournament. It is! Can you imagine Sweden versus Romania selling out Wembley Stadium on a Sunday lunchtime? I can't but, at Stanford Stadium, the attendance for this game was 81,715! Incredible. Stanford Stadium forms part of the campus for Stanford University which is one of the largest and most highly rated universities in the world. When we were there, the Stadium had a running track which has since been removed as part of a fundamental reconstruction of the stadium.
Romania had won Group A, a Group which included the hosts, the USA, Colombia and Switzerland. Colombia's participation is remembered for the fate of one of their players Andres Escobar who was shot dead on his return to Colombia after his own goal in Colombia's match against the USA. In the Round of 16 Romania had, to my delight following their antics in the 1990 World Cup, overcome Argentina 3-2 and now faced Sweden for a place in the final four. Romania's side included "the Maradona of the Carpathians" Gheorghe Hagi, Florin Raducioiu, Dan Petrescu (or Pet Rescue as I preferred to call him) and future Spurs players Gica Popescu and Ilie Dumitrescu.
Sweden had successfully navigated Group B undefeated in a Group containing Brazil, Russia and Cameroon. They'd received a favourable draw in the Round of 16 where they eliminated surprise qualifiers Saudi Arabia 3-1 in Dallas. The Swedes were enjoying one of their most successful tournaments ever and their side included goal keeper Thomas Ravelli, Roland Nilsson, Tomas Brolin (yes really), Kennet Andersen and Martin Dahlin. A young Henrik Larsson also came on as a substitute in the game.
The scoring didn't commence until the 79th minute when Tomas Brolin scored Sweden's first from a well worked free kick. This was the same Brolin who would go on to milk Leeds United for cash whilst being slow and fat! That we thought was that as the clock ticked down towards the final minute. But no, wait! A last minute equaliser scored by Raducioiu from a lucky deflection following a set piece took the game into extra time. Ten minutes into extra time and Raducioiu scored again to give Romania a surprise lead. With five minutes remining it was Sweden's turn to get out of jail with a headed equaliser scored by Kennet Andersson. There was to be no further scoring. We had penalties!
Hakan Mild missed Sweden's first penalty but Dan Petrescu missed the fourth one for Romanian and, at 4-4 after five penalties each we were into sudden death. Young Larsson scored Sweden's sixth penalty and booked Sweden's place in the World Cup Semi-Final when Romania's Miodrag Belodedici subsequently missed another. Sweden would face Brazil.
CRB Match No. 902
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