Boasting an architectural heritage that stretched back millennia and saw groovy new stadia built for the 1990 World Cup in Bari and Turin - and stadia especially renovated in Cagliari, Florence, Milan, Naples, Palermo, Rome and Verona - Italy let its violent and disappointing World Cup finals play out between disappointing, random sets of box-nets.
And not even a fat man singing Puccini could hide Italy's missed opportunity to make its mark in the history of on-field architecture.
A dirty backroom deal awarded Mexico its second tournament in only sixteen years and gave FIFA a TV on which to broadcast to the world that at the end of the 20th century they wanted football to be like McDonalds - anywhere you went in the world, it'd all be the same.
The enormous free-hanging box-nets installed at each stadium were not only a re-statement that the goals first seen in the 1974 tournament, were the first-class, on-field architecture of choice for the future. They also marked the beginning of the era of football as a brand on global TV.
Previously you could sight the goalnets on TV and identify which stadium the game was being played in.
After Mexico '86, it was possible only to glance up and say, "It's football."
The 1982 World Cup finals were played out within a hybrid 24 team format, and between horrible hybrid goal nets that were neither the L-supports seen at Argentina 78, nor the monstrous box nets we'd see in Mexico four years later.
The Poland - Italy semi-final was played at Barcelona's Camp Nou, but you wouldn't know that if watching on TV and seeing only these charmless and characterless goal nets.
This is all the more regrettable given Barcelona played out the 1981-82 season between the stanchions that had made Camp Nou instantly recognisable on TV.
In 1982 Pepsi was a major sponsor of Real Madrid. However, such is the power of FIFA that for the World Cup finals they replaced all Pepsi signage at the Bernabeu with the logo of their own major sponsor - Coca Cola.
If FIFA could remove Pepsi, getting shot of the old stanchions at the Bernabeu was no problem.
Madrid played out the 1981-82 season between the old curved stanchions of Puskas, di Stefano and Gento.
And though the Bernabeu went on to host one of the memorable World Cup moments...
By removing the old stanchions - the on-field signifier of Madrid location for everyone watching on TV - FIFA effectively took the game from the grass of the Bernabeu and uploaded it to a placeless cloud called 'FIFA World Cup.'
Extra time in the 1978 World Cup Final. Amidst a series of Argentine attacks that had begun to resemble cavalry charges, Mario Kempes slalomed through the Netherlands defence for 2-1. But the goalkeeper Jan Jongbloed blocked the shot. The ball ricocheted off Kempes, arced into the air and for a moment the watching world held its breath...
Argentina were awarded the tournament in 1964 but by the time 1978 came round the country was ruled by a ferocious military junta that had disappeared 30,000 of its own citizens and were desperate for the World Cup victory that would lend a legitimacy to their regime. As such, the 1978 World Cup became the most politicised sporting event since the Berlin Olympics of 1936.
The on-field architecture designed for the tournament were goalnets supported by fancy L's and posts with distinctive black bands round the base. For the second successive tournament they were newly installed and uniform across all 6 stadia .
On a carpet of bogroll and shredded newspaper the generals got their victory but at what price to the game? The new world champions stood accused of gamesmanship, intimidation and bribery.
For the future of football, the world held its breath.
Before the violence and negativity of the 1986 and 1990 tournaments plunged the game to new depths of despair, the 1974 World Cup with its miserly 2.55 goals per game was considered the nadir of football history.
At a distance of 44 years it can now be seen as the apotheosis of European football.
Holland destroyed Uruguay, Argentina and Brazil. West Germany became champions and the pace and tempo demonstrated by each became the new standard in world football
Matches were played at 9 different stadia but for the first time the on-field architecture was standardised.
The 1970 finals were the first to be broadcast live in colour and they're rightfully remembered for the champions Brazil's kaleidoscope of 19 goals from 6 games - including the four in the final against Italy, into the L supports at the Estadio Azteca in Mexico City.
Brazil scored 15 goals in their five games at the Estadio Jalisco in Guadalajara - 16 if this one had gone in!
Away from the fiesta in Guadalajara there were notable net supports in Puebla:
Considering England were awarded the 1966 finals for forming the FA a hundred years before; that their side became champions with no-wingers and a formation that firmly turned its back on Hungary and the lessons of '53; and most importantly that the goalnets were hung on stanchions as English as World Cup Willie then the '66 finals could be seen as the empire's last hurrah.
But with journalists from a greater diversity of countries than ever before attending the tournament, the matches broadcast live to the world for the first time and these Continental D's supporting the nets at Hillsborough, Sheffield -
the 1966 finals could as easily be seen as the first of the modern tournaments.
Games for the 1966 finals were held at seven other venues, including:
Wembley
Goodison Park
White City Stadium, London - used only because Wembley refused to cancel the scheduled greyhound racing for the same night as Uruguay v France, hence the temporary look of the goalposts
But pride of place goes to the awesome 1966 hardware at:
The Chilean FA told FIFA they had to give Chile the World Cup "because we have nothing else."
So Chile won the rights to host the 1962 tournament and they got plenty in return: Garrincha in his prime, the Italy v Chile Battle of Santiago and these stanchions of almost perfect quarter circumference on which to hang the tournament's nets.
Though football on TV was in its infancy and the matches at the '62 finals were not broadcast live, the influence of the tournament could be seen in the stanchions installed at stadia as diverse as Estadio Bernabeu, Madrid -
Following the weekend's FA Cup shocks of Forest beating Arsenal and Coventry defeating Stoke, the History of Goal Nets kicks off 2018 with a glance back at FA Cup shocks of the past, and the terrific goal nets architecture that hosted the matches.
Sutton United v Coventry City 1987
Great white saggy nets, Chelsea-style crooked A-frames. Two goals from corners.
Wrexham v Arsenal 1992
Strict triangular Continental D's as per the early 1990's fashion at the old Racecourse Ground (and check out David Seaman being beaten on his post by Mickey Thomas' free-kick.)
Manchester United v Southampton 1976
The grandfather of upsets and the grandmother of old goal nets. Always - always - loved the way Bobby Stokes shot rebounded off the old Wembley stanchion...
