On This Day: Israel 2-1 Argentina, 1998

Celebrating fifty years of independence, Argentina were somehow persuaded to come and play a friendly at Teddy Kollek Stadium. Ortega didn’t bother, but Batistuta did, and on one of the hottest days since the fucking dawn of time, Israel somehow finagled a win. Ghrayib opened the scoring after sixty-three minutes, thumping into the roof from the box’s edge, before a header from someone I’m afraid I neither recognise nor remember equalised. Then, with eight minutes to go, Israel won a free-kick wide on the left, thirty-odd yards from goal, and with everyone expecting a cross, Revivo spotted a gap at the near post and slotted superbly into it, making Burgos look exceptionally silly.

Here’s some highly weird pre-match footage, with goals cursorily appended so as to make them almost impossible to see:

And here are better highlights: