My wife was out tonight so I resisted the temptation to watch the final of Celebrity Big Brother (although going O/T for a moment, how the hell did Ulrika win???????) and instead watched the 'Classic Cup Encounters' DVD I got for Christmas.
It is absoultely brilliant showing Watford coverage from the BBC archives. It's the best club video/DVD I've ever seen. Its great to see how much the ground has changed, going from being pretty unrecgonisable in 1970 through until the classic days of the Family Enclosure and Terrace in the 80's. Two of the best games I've ever seen are included, Kaiserslautern (H) and Arsenal (A) as well as some games I wasn't even really aware of like the wins over Man Utd (H) and West Ham (H) in 81/82.
The only oddity is why the DVD then leaps twenty years and includes our quarter final win over Plymouth from 2007. I can think of many better candidates such as Plymouth (N) in 1984, Leeds (H) in 1992, Sheff Wed (H) in 1998 and Sunderland (A) or Burnley (H) in 2003. It's as if they had a spare five minutes left over that they decided to fill up with the first thing that came to hand. This was the only game I didn't watch in full.
Maybe its a bit of a cliche but most of the old action seems like a different game, let alone just being a different era. I doubt many of the pitches the games were played on would get the go ahead today, especially the Grimsby away match played on a mud bath. The tackling is hard and brutal, the aftermath of which results in the ref having a couple of words and then walking away, rather than the player walking down the tunnel. There are injuries aplenty and the play just continues however badly hurt the player appears.
The goals are fantastic. Luther's brace against Man U at Old Trafford, Callys cheeky backheel against West Ham and John Barnes sublime chip against Birmingham among the best. In fact that Barnes chip is as good as Glenn Hoddle's swivel and chip when he beat Sherwood at the Rookery end.
Fantastically bits of the original MOTD/Sportsnight broadcasts have been left in, so you get to see Jimmy Hill and Harry Carpenter's post match comments. You even hear a rare bit of Des Lynam actually commentating on a game and rather badly too. I can see why he was quickly moved to a studio job.
Interviews and footage of Elton and Graham are also included. In the current context the most interesting bit for me is an interview Graham gives in response to criticism of Watford's direct style of play. He says he hates sophisticated football and that the man on the street is not going to pay to watch a team put together 15 or 16 passes. I only hope he still holds that view and has a bit clout on this new board he's just joined.
This is a brilliant DVD and there is definitely scope to do another one. Also what about a league version? Maybe highlights of our time in the old Division One? It would be the first thing on my Christmas list for 2009.
