My first World Cup memories come from Mexico 86 and specifically the South Korean team.

I remember having a Daily Mirror wall chart on my bedroom wall with a rather prominent Peter Shilton at the centre of it. It was the middle page of the newspaper. None of these glossy pull-outs the kids these days get. I suspect filling in the scores ruined the wallpaper behind it. I’ve tried to look it up on Google (various other past wall charts are there) but to no avail. It is possible that it doesn’t exist and my mind is playing tricks on me.

On the footballing side the thing I remember most was the adventurous long range shooting of the South Korean team.

South Korea at that time weren’t the most prestigious of footballing nations. In fact they still aren’t. They are currently, somehow, ranked below England, Wales, Northern Ireland and Scotland in the FIFA rankings. Even according to the ELO rankings Wales and England are better than them (and, let’s face it, why should we trust the FIFA ranking system in which you can win a match and as a result move down in the rankings). They were so highly regarded coming into Mexico 86 that Panini assigned them “2 players to a sticker” status.

Their first match was against (eventual winners) Argentina. I recall them playing Belgium but Wikipedia tells me that never happened. Obviously the team must have been concerned that they might not get very many shots on goal as their tactics appeared to be to take as many long range shots as possible. As a 9 year old I was fascinated by this innovative approach.

Like all classic encounters the full 90 minutes of the match are available on Youtube. Well, except for the parts where it suddenly switches over to the game between the Soviet Union and Hungary (even the commentator is surprised).

What was your first World Cup memory?