This week ESPN FC is counting down, in chronological order, 10 of the best goals scored at the World Cup. We'll be bringing you two of the finest per day, but add your own and join the debate in our comments section or via the hashtag #FCWorldCupgoals. Users in the U.S. can watch each goal in the video above, but those outside please click here.
Just five months after his international debut, England striker Geoff Hurst made World Cup history. West Germany were the opponents the day he won his first international cap in February 1966 and it was against the very same nation that he etched his name into the history books of football's most famous competition, becoming the first -- and as of now, the only -- player to score a hat trick in a World Cup final.
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Hurst was an unlikely hero, chiefly because he was not even a member of manager Alf Ramsay's starting XI as England kicked off the tournament on home soil, looking to become the first hosts to lift the World Cup since Italy did so 32 years earlier. Hurst had plundered 23 goals for West Ham in the 1965-66 season, but the more experienced Jimmy Greaves of Tottenham partnered with Liverpool's Roger Hunt up front.
In England's third group game, however, Greaves was injured. Hurst was called upon for a brutal quarterfinal against Argentina, and after scoring the winner and impressing with his physical prowess, he retained his place for both the semifinal victory over Portugal and -- despite widespread calls for Greaves to be restored -- the final at Wembley Stadium against West Germany.
"Sometimes players emerge as we did through the tournament," Hurst recalled to ESPN FC in 2010. "It changed in the last three games from the team that started. The team he picked pushed themselves into the side -- particularly the wide players, Alan Ball and Martin Peters. My own situation was more fortuitous because of the injury to Jimmy."
Hurst had proven to be a man for the big occasion at club level, scoring in West Ham's 1964 FA Cup final victory, and Ramsey urged him to do so again. "Alf talked very rarely to the team collectively," Hurst said. "It was very much to me that he was reminding you individually of why you were picked and the things that you did well for your club. I think that was the important thing for me, and I'm sure he did the same for everyone else."
The match itself was a topsy-turvy affair -- one of the finest World Cup finals ever witnessed. West Germany's early opener was equalised soon after by Hurst before Martin Peters gave England the lead with 12 minutes to play. Ever-resilient, West Germany's Wolfgang Weber snatched an 89th-minute leveler and the game headed into extra time.
Hurst's second goal -- scored 11 minutes into extra time -- was hugely controversial, as Azerbaijani linesman Tofiq Bahramov ruled that his effort had crossed the line after striking the crossbar and bouncing toward the goal line. The debate has raged since about the legitimacy of the goal, but the decision stood and West Germany were forced to go in search of another equaliser as the final whistle drew closer.
Then came Hurst's golden moment.
With just shy of 97,000 spectators looking on and a British-record TV audience of 32.3 million -- a figure that remarkably remains unsurpassed to this day -- Hurst picked up a long pass from West Ham teammate and inspirational national team skipper Bobby Moore.
It had been an energy-sapping encounter, but Hurst defied the fatigue to race clear. With supporters beginning to encroach on the pitch believing the game to be over, Hurst continued his marauding run into the penalty area and unleashed a rasping left-foot shot that thundered high beyond the reach of Hans Tilkowski. The goal was immortalised by the commentary of the late, great Kenneth Wolstenholme, who said: "Some people are on the pitch! They think it's all over! It is now, it's four!"
Hugh McIlvanney, then chief sports correspondent for the Observer newspaper, conveyed the enormity of the moment in his match report: "The greatest moment in the history of English football came at 5:15 this afternoon when Geoff Hurst shot the magnificent goal that made certain of the World Cup. It was Hurst's third goal, England's fourth, and, coming as it did in the final seconds of extra time, it shattered the last remnants of German resistance.”
England had triumphed on home soil, and a nation celebrated thanks to the finishing prowess of a man who two years earlier had spent his summer playing cricket for Essex Second XI. It remains the Three Lions' only taste of World Cup glory and has ensured that Hurst has enjoyed hero status for the past 48 years.
"It's amazing to me that, all these years on, people come up to me and say congratulations," Hurst said. "We didn't realise the impact it would have not only on ourselves but also the country. Nobody can compare the memories we share with the fan in the street."