Golaço Stories

Hamburg SV used to have one of the most unique traditions in the world of soccer, their stadium featured a clock that counted down to the second how much time the club had spent in the top German flight. Since Hamburg had never been relegated, the count has it's starting point in 1963, at the exact moment the unified Bundesliga began.  This clock was a source of pride for the fans, after all many German clubs who are more successful than Hamburg have been relegated so the clock represented an assertion of greatest. Simultaneously, however, it was also a disaster...

Despite living in the shadow of Chivas, Atlas has always been a historic and traditional club in Guadalajara and in Mexico as a whole. In 1951 the club was crowned national champion for the first time bringing its' millions of fans immeasurable joy. In 1954, during the 3 year anniversary of that title, a representative of the city of Guadalajara gifted the club a bottle of Ballentine's Whiskey and made the club promise it wouldn't open the bottle until the club won the championship again. The instructions were even written in pen on the front of the box the bottle came...

HNK Rijeka might be soccer's best example of the complex geography and history of Europe. The Croatian club has an unbelievable history in which it has lifted trophies in 5 different countries without ever having been relocated since its foundation. To situate yourself better below is a map of modern-day Europe and where the city of Rijeka is located exactly within Croatia. The saga begins in 1906 when the club was founded as CS Olimpia in the city of Rijeka in what at the time was the Austria-Hungary Empire (see map below). In Austria-Hungary, CS Olimpia got a silver trophy...

Imagine spending 200 million euros, on a near 70,000 seat stadium, in one of the richest cities of the country, home to the counties most popular and domestically successful club, and yet it's such a disaster it gets demolished in just 16 years. This is the story of the Stadio Delle Alpi (Stadium of the Alps) in Turin, Italy, temporary home of Juventus and Torino. The stadium was an ambitious project aimed at replacing the aging Stadio Comunale and being one of the major stages of the 1990 FIFA World Cup.  Immediately the major issues were evident. First of all...

The Copa Del Rey did not always have the format it has today. When it was founded in 1903 it consisted of champions and runner-ups of regional leagues. In the late 1920's Spanish soccer reorganized to have a national league along the lines of what we see today, and therefore the Copa Del Rey also had to be restructured both in terms of format and qualification method. In May of 1927 Real Union won the last Copa Del Rey in the old format defeating Arenas Club in the final by 1-0. Nevertheless the Spanish Federation wanted to give the "old"...