World Cup-winning England goalkeeper Gordon Banks dies at 81
LONDON — Piercing the roar of the crowd, in the searing heat of Guadalajara, Mexico, Gordon Banks heard Pele shout “Goal!”
Aiming a header to bounce off the hard field, Pele was certain the ball would creep inside the England goalkeeper’s right post and threw his arms into the air to celebrate what he thought was an opening goal for Brazil.
Banks, though, had already scurried across his line as the cross was coming into the penalty area, dived and with his outstretched right hand scooped the ball over the crossbar.
The supreme feat of athleticism and agility on soccer’s biggest stage became widely acclaimed as the save of the century. When Banks died on Tuesday at age 81, this was the viral moment from an analogue age racking up millions of views across social media.
Banks already had cemented his status as one of English soccer’s most revered players four years earlier in helping soccer’s home nation win what remains its only World Cup title. He conceded only one goal in five games, on a penalty kick by Portugal’s Eusebio, before England’s 4-2 win over West Germany in the final at Wembley Stadium.
“They won’t remember me for winning the World Cup,” Banks said. “It will be for that save.”
Pele himself once compared it to a “salmon leaping up a waterfall ,” and says the save remains among the best he has ever seen.
“Banks appeared in my sight like a kind of blue phantom,” Pele recalled Tuesday. “He came from nowhere and he did something I didn’t feel was possible. He pushed my header, somehow, up and over. And I couldn’t believe what I saw. Even now when I watch it l, I can’t believe it. I can’t believe how he moved so far, so fast.”
Brazil won that 1970 group game 1-0 and then went on to its third World Cup title. Banks was beaten by the player who had provided that earlier cross for Pele — Jairzinho — but the save has gained more recognition than the goal in the annals of soccer history.
It was the result of Banks’ attention to detail in training sessions in Mexico.
“I noticed that when the ball was dropping in front of me, it was kicking up, not staying low like it did in England,” Banks recalled in January 2018 at a Football Writers’ Association tribute dinner to Pele. “I stopped back to do some extra shooting training to help me get used to it, and that helped me make the save.”
It still required quite a bit of improvisation as well.
“I knew that I had to come off the line to narrow the angle, then once Pele had punched it with his head down to my righthand side, I knew I had to get over there very quickly,” Banks said.
“The ball was going in and as I dived I had to anticipate how high it was going to come up from the hard surface.
“As I reached across, I got it right, the ball hit the top of my hand and went off.”
At that moment Pele was already wheeling away in celebration.
“As I hit the floor I saw that the ball had missed the goal,” Banks said in a 2017 interview with the BBC. “At first I thought, ‘You lucky so-and-so,’ but then I realized it has been a bit special.”
It forged a special bond between one of the greatest strikers and goalkeepers. When a statute of Banks was unveiled outside Stoke City’s stadium in 2008, Pele attended the ceremony.