High point of a player's career

pickarooney

I was watching that clip of Davide Gualtieri scoring against England straight after the kick-off and thinking that guy must have known right at that moment he was running off to celebrate that this was the zenith of his footballing career.

I don't know if it's a good thing in general for a player to have this realisation that "this is it". On the one hand you can make the most of your moment in the sun but on the other is the fact that it's all downhill from here.

What single moment would you pick to highlight any player's career? Some players are lucky enough in that there are a few to choose from (Zidane's volley in the CL final or either of his goals in the WC, Bergkamp's goals against Newcastle and Argentina). Others have high points which are also low points (Keane against Juve in '99, arguably Maradona against England in '86) while more have a memorable moment in an unimportant match (Higuita against England, Zlatan against NAC Breda, Roberto Carlos against France).

A couple that spring to mind of lesser players who are remembered for one moment:

Davide Gualtieri, San Marino v England '93

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGdQvqbIexk

Saeed Al Owairan, Saudi Arabia v Belgium, WC 94'

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZX6LXL9Pjc

The_Kew_Tour

Alan Mcloughlin. Good player, but will only be remembered for his goal that got us to USA.

Big Pussy Bonpensiero

Dean Windass scoring the "£60 million" goal at Wembley.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=A667RlDOy2g

HalloweenJack

Jurgen Sparwasser.

German who scored the winner for East Germany against West Germany at the 1974 World Cup in Hamburg. Don't know how it felt for him but the East Germans made a massive deal out of it.

kitakyushu

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PA9EByvjG3M

Goalkeeper Jimmy Glass scoring in final minute of injury time of last game of the season to help his team (on loan) avoid relegation from the football league.

Balmed Out

Jimmy Glass the Carlisle goalkeeper scores a goal in injury time to keep them in the football league.

Beaten to it by a minute

LuckyLloyd

Matt Holland and Mark Kinsella might have thought 'wow, I may never have a 90 minutes as good' when they were walking off after we played Cameroon in 2002.

mike65

Djimi Traore - Champions League final, esp that goal line clearance as Shevchenko had sight of goal

kitakyushu

mike65 wrote: »

Djimi Traore - Champions League final, esp that goal line clearance as Shevchenko had sight of goal

I always figured the first time he heard his terrace chant would have been the personal highlight of his career.

The_Kew_Tour

Any of the Greece team from 2004 must ave thought it won't get any better then this.

kitakyushu

The_Kew_Tour wrote: »

Any of the Greece team from 2004 must ave thought it won't get any better then this.

When something works out that well I bet they had one eye on the 2006 World Cup.

HeisenbergBB

GavRedKing

Lampard's brace against Bolton to win us the League title for the first time in 50 years.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Hg4Y1EFPItY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fy1NAzeiWiI

GavRedKing

Ronnie Radford v Newcastle, excellent strike on a horrible pitch!!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z-ze42I6NEo

SEPT 23 1989

Most important Manchester City goal ever scored

MickySticks

Good old Ronny :pac:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tm2NyeFUxbw

Say Your Number

The winning goal by Sunday Oliseh for Nigeria against Spain in the '98 world cup which effectively knocked Spain out of the tournament.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-zwNmuudmUU

NoelJ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUW8wFOytiY

This goal due to the significance of it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yCxe4r6SjH0

This also was amazing.

dan1895

How can an OG that got the poor man murdered be the peak of his career?

Kerrydude1981

Three old school goals,

Keith Houchen scoring for Coventry in the FA Cup final in 87,the title of the thread suits him

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1Q5-ANGlhuM

And this goal by Norman Whiteside,probably the high point of his career in a Man Utd shirt,its against Everton in the 85 FA Cup final

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iVbUoGm4lw0

And Gazzas goal against Arsenal in the 91 semi,for me this was when he was at the peak of his powers,injuries plagued his career after this

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QYCaS-2Om8g

MrStuffins

NoelJ wrote: »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MUW8wFOytiY

This goal due to the significance of it.

I don't think you quite get the notion of a "high point" in ones career!

EdenHazard

Landons goal!

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2bg8vQKN4m8

kitakyushu

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S6XDvQkI7uI

That's Iniesta sorted for free drink in Spain for life.

Neil3030

NoelJ

dan1895 wrote: »

How can an OG that got the poor man murdered be the peak of his career?

I read the ops original post wrong when he mentioned about high and low points of careers. Obviously its not a high point.

dan1895

NoelJ wrote: »

I read the ops original post wrong when he mentioned about high and low points of careers. Obviously its not a high point.

He was talking about Maradonna's hand of God incident but anyway, defo low point

Balmed Out

This is a low point but I felt for the guy. One of the best players of his generation and the star of the Italian national team Baggio misses a penalty in the 94 world cup final. It was the last Italian penalty too.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=voT5W9Doa-s