- 27/04/2025
In 1993, England's World Cup qualification hopes hung by a thread. Their only hope was to inflict a crushing defeat on a team of amateurs and hope other results went their way.
But less than 9 seconds into the game, they suffered their most embarrassing moment in their history. This is the true story of that goal, as told by the man who scored it...
But less than 9 seconds into the game, they suffered their most embarrassing moment in their history. This is the true story of that goal, as told by the man who scored it...
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00:00There's no picture of the goal I scored against England in 1993. Everything happened in only
00:098.3 seconds. So fast that I surprised not just David Seaman, but all the photographers too.
00:14Our stadium in San Marino displays images of various players and goals, though none of our
00:19most famous strike. Unfortunately, all that exists is a still of television footage. Too fuzzy to be
00:26hung on a wall, but those 8.3 seconds changed my life. People still know me and that goal against England.
00:34Oh, hello everyone. Adam Muck here, and this is the incredible story of David Galtieri.
00:41The man who inflicted arguably the most embarrassing moment the England national team ever, ever, ever
00:47suffered. A goal for San Marino just 8.3 seconds into the match. The tale of this goal is a fascinating
00:56one. And he's told us all about it in the latest edition of 442. Look at that. Available now in
01:02all good retailers. Anyway, for the purposes of this video, though, the role of David Galtieri
01:09will be told by me, Adam Muck. Just in case you were wondering why a 52-year-old bloke from San
01:15Marino sounds like a 24-year-old lad from Stockport. Anyway, nonetheless, enjoy.
01:21In November 1993, English football was still plagued by hooliganism. Because of that, when
01:27we were scheduled to host England in the last qualifier for the 1994 World Cup, it was impossible
01:32for the match to be held at our normal home, the Stadio Olimpico di Saravelli in San Marino.
01:38Maybe 600 or 700 visitors arrived from England. Some stayed in Rimini, about 15 miles away from
01:43San Marino, and they caused quite a bit of trouble. It was all over the news for many, many days.
01:48Police units flooded in from everywhere to tackle them. That's why the match was switched
01:52to an alternative ground, to make crowd control much easier.
01:55The game was on a Wednesday evening, so on the Tuesday we travelled 65 miles north-west
02:00to Bologna, and headed straight to the Stadio Renato dell'Aro for our final training session.
02:06Massimo Benini was amongst our squad. He was the best player in the team. He was our point
02:10of reference on the pitch who'd always push us up the field and drive us forward. He made
02:15us feel secure. He'd played for Juventus and Bologna, so he invited two of his friends,
02:20Ivano Bonetti and Marco Di Marchi, to join us at training. They both played for Bologna
02:25as well. At the end of the session, we practised free kicks and you could see the difference
02:28between them and us. They had a pub together in the city, which we popped to afterwards.
02:33We walked around town and it was quite emotional. Everyone was looking at us in our smart San Marino
02:38tracksuits. We were a group of friends, and we'd joke with each other, simply to play against
02:43top internationals. Guys we'd normally see on TV. It was already the prize for us. All
02:47we could do was give 100%. It was unthinkable to ever keep up with the major nations, so
02:52whenever possible we tried to keep the ball and use up some minutes really. We suffered
02:56heavy defeats. No one wanted to lose, but it was inevitable. Football belongs to everyone,
03:01not only the big teams and the great players.
03:03On the night of the match against England, I was nervous. I was 22 and it was my first time
03:08in the starting XI for the national team. It was an important game for England. They were
03:11still fighting with the Netherlands for a spot at the World Cup. England had to beat
03:15us by a 7 goal margin, and hope that the Dutch lost in Poland. When the match kicked off though,
03:20it all went so quickly. Bacchiocci to Benigni, then to Monzeroli, back to Bacchiocci, who immediately
03:26just tried to play it onto me. As I darted in from the right flank, his pass was way too powerful.
03:32But Stuart Pearce tried to tap the ball towards Seaman and it fell short, and I was there. I accepted
03:37his gift. Slipping past Pearce and nudging the ball beyond Seaman, with the tip of my
03:41foot to put us one hill up. At first, I didn't really appreciate what had happened. I was pretty
03:46nippy then, a winger who could go one on one, but I never would have expected anything like that.
03:50Against England. On my first start for San Marino. How can you imagine running 50 metres
03:54and then scoring like that? Okay, Usain Bolt needed 9.58 seconds to dash twice as far, but it's not quite the
04:01same thing. It wasn't until long after the final whistle when I left our changing room and several
04:05reporters were waiting outside for me, that I found out I'd known I'd broken a record for
04:09the fastest goal in a World Cup qualifier. Paul Ince struck in the equaliser, but that goal should
04:14have been ruled out. They'd been a clear foul beforehand. After they scored, it became harder
04:18and harder to match their intensity, and they were twice as strong as us and twice as fast.
04:23Those who represent San Marino these days are fitter than we were. We probably needed a drip feed to
04:28keep up with our rivals. I made a few tackles in that match that would have shattered any of my teammates,
04:32but I don't think England even felt a scratch. Pearce lifted me up a couple of times, as if to say,
04:38move out the way please, we're playing for real here. Luka Gabi was meant to be man marking Les
04:42Ferdinand, but despite stepping on his foot to stop him from jumping, Luka was lifted into the air when
04:47Ferdinand decided he had to leap for a header. Davide, he makes me jump with him! Luka exclaimed
04:52to me at the end of the game. We eventually lost the match 7-1, which was a pity that night. I was upset
04:57about the seven goals we conceded, rather than happy about the one that I scored. But there was a giant
05:02gulf between the teams and we couldn't do much to hide it. Thankfully, the Dutch did win 3-1 in
05:07Poland to progress behind Norway. If they'd slipped up and my goal had stopped England going to the
05:12World Cup, it would have created a huge fuss, even bigger than the one it did. I hope it wasn't my
05:17goal that forced Graham Taylor to step down as manager, but rather the fact that they actually
05:21missed out on qualification. As it was, my goal was somehow accepted and almost welcomed back in
05:26England. I was on the front page of the next morning's Daily Mirror, alongside the headline,
05:31end of the world. My parents had friends over in the UK and they sent me a copy.
05:35I had it framed and I still guard it jealously. I'm on Wikipedia and I've had a conversation with
05:40FIFA president Gianni Infantino, who knows of my story. I became a hero in Scotland too,
05:46during qualifying for Euro 96. We were down in the same group as them. I was injured ahead of the away
05:51game so couldn't make the trip to Glasgow, but many supporters that day wore t-shirts saying
05:56Galtieri. 8 seconds. I'd love to have got one. My teammates said the Scotland fans couldn't wait
06:01to see me play and that I was their idol because of what I'd done against England. My brother is a
06:06doctor and two years later he participated in a football tournament for European hospitals,
06:10which was actually in Scotland. When people heard that he was my brother,
06:14he enjoyed free food and drinks for two days. These days I'm a computer salesman with a small
06:19company in a shop. Things turned out well and many of my teammates from that England game are doing
06:23fine. Our goalkeeper, Pierluigi Benedettini, has a bus company. He was at the wheel in 1993.
06:29He drove from San Marino to Bologna and back. Nicola Bacchiacci has a hardware store with his brother.
06:35Mirko Giannari works in the pharmaceutical industry and Loris Zanotti has a construction company.
06:40Mauro Valentini is an accountant. Massimo Benini is an estate agent and Claudio Conti works at San
06:47Marino Mail. And Pierre Domenico Deleval is employed by the San Marino State Electrical Company.
06:53William Guerrera is a painter, while Pierangelo Manzaroli is the manager of a local football
06:58academy. I also coach San Giovanni, a small futsal club here. There are 30,000 people in San Marino
07:04and even now, 30 years on, everyone remembers me and my goal. I did something unique, a feat that the
07:10locals directly associate with their country. My pals and I still talk about it when we go out for dinner.
07:15They show me pictures of me 30 years ago, when I still had all my hair. They joke,
07:198 seconds? That's exactly how long you last in bed. And that that watch must have been damaged.
07:24Months ago, a few English guys living in Ramini would walk into my shop and ask to take pictures
07:29with me. A young Japanese director did a documentary on San Marino and came to gather footage.
07:34I also hosted producers and cameramen of an English TV production company based near Buckingham Palace.
07:39In 2020, a British TV channel made a series, Reuniting England Icons. It was called Harry's
07:44Heroes and they set up a few friendly matches around Europe. They played a game against Germany
07:49and another here in San Marino. Their manager, Harry Redknapp, came to my shop with John Barnes.
07:54He was as crazy as a horse. He was also a very funny guy. The show wasn't entirely about me,
07:59but I had an important role to play due to what had happened in Bologna. At the beginning of our
08:03rematch against England Legends, it was all about whether I could score again after 8 seconds.
08:08Obviously, I couldn't. Matt Letissier was in their team and still an excellent player.
08:12The nicest part of it all was finally meeting David Seaman and talking to him. I'd been longing for
08:17that to happen. We drank a beer together after the game and discussed life. He's massive. Like a
08:22wardrobe. I still can't believe I scored against him. He says he loves to go fishing and he's
08:26enjoying retirement. We swapped shirts and took photos together. He was really gentle and friendly
08:31with me. However, with all due respect to him and Gibraltar, scoring against England isn't the same as
08:36doing it against them. That's the way it is though. Records were always there to be broken and one day his
08:40record will fall too. Especially now that you don't have kickoff by touching the ball forward,
08:44you can save up half a second really. I'm more than happy about how my career panned out. I also
08:49played against the Dutch, taking to the pitch alongside Frank Reichard, Frank De Boer, Mark
08:54Overmars and Dennis Bergkamp as well, who was a superstar at Inter with Aaron Winter. For the under-21s,
08:59I earned the chance to line up against Robert Prozinecki and Vladimir Djugovic, two champions from the
09:04old Yugoslavia. And then came that moment. My one amazing moment. Followed by the end of the world
09:10headline and my chat with David Seaman many years later. To come full circle, I'd love to meet Stuart
09:14Pearce as well one day. I'm sorry that people still associate him with that mistake, but I'm not sure
09:19he cares now. We swapped shirts at the end of the match but never spoke about what happened or how we
09:23felt really. Either on that night or at any time since. We've not had the opportunity to talk again, although
09:29I'd like to. I owe him a favour. One beer. Perhaps even two or three if he wants. They'll be on me.
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