Goal Nets

My first memories of football were bizarrely the goal nets at the different grounds, and the fact that in the 80s you could tell instantaneously which ground a game on TV was taking place, simply from a glimpse of the goal structure behind the muddy overweight keeper.

This may seem a bizarre recollection, but I think this feature gave such character to the English and Italian games. I’m sure other countries has a similar phenomenon, but the English and Italian leagues were the only competitions I watched. Not the Germans though, who had standardised goal nets much like those in the Football League today - mid depth, with the nets supported by separate posts at the back.

Whilst the German league had all colour taken out of it by the regimented netting, the English league flourished with diversity.

We had the teams that favoured coloured nets to complement their teams - red at Anfield, blue at Goodison Park, yellow at Carrow Road and red at The City Ground.

We had the striped brigade which used the coloured netting and white netting - purple for The Hawthorns, red for Roker Park, black for Burnden Park and blue for Ewood Park.

We had goal structures with elaborate woodwork support behind the goal itself - think White Hart Lane, Elm Park, Ayresome Park, The Dell and The Manor Ground.

Chelsea and Fulham had goal frame set ups which looked like those little cages you take the cat to the vet in.

We had the super shallow nets at Loftus Road and Filbert Street, contrasting with the super deep nets at the Azteca and Guadalajara during Mexico 86.

And then we had the completely unique nets. You could almost fully furnish the back of John Lukic’s goal at Highbury, so extensive was the room behind the goal-line. I’m also fairly certain that Millwall used to have vomit coloured netting at The Old Den.

Finally of course there was Wembley. So many memories are associated with those quarter segment beams and wide netting, and I’m certain they will live longer in the memory than anything the new Wembley throws up.

Euro 96 changed everything in England, as the stadiums were expanded, and the nettings rationalised. Suddenly Anfield looked like a standard Bundeslinga stadium, and the red netting of The City Ground was gone. Everything looked like Germany ‘74 and was to never change again, as the trend filtered down to the lower league clubs. I’ve never fathomed out why everyone decided to go this way - perhaps with the support posts at the back you get less net damage, thus saving clubs money. I still cling to the hope that one day I’ll show up for a new season at Watford, and they will have abandoned the “Germany 74 Directive” and will have decked out Vicarage Road with bright yellow nets and an elaborate beam support network behind the posts.

I doubt it will ever happen - and there are no prizes for recalling which country won Euro 96…