'As each new World Cup approaches, I always turn my mind back to July 30, 1966, and the day that changed my life forever.' Legendary England World Cup winner TheGeoffHurst reflects on his life and career in this exclusive essay. FIFAWorldCup | ENG
As each new World Cup approaches, I always turn my mind back to July 30, 1966, and the day that changed my life forever.
I didn't know for sure until the eve of the game that I was in the team, and it's hard now to conjure up the memory of how exciting it was to be playing for my country in the World Cup final against West Germany because it was so long ago. In the very last minute of extra time, I remember my West Ham teammate Bobby Moore—the greatest player and, in many ways the greatest person, I have ever known in my lifetime—being the coolest person in the stadium.
Luckily for me, I connected perfectly and it flew into the top corner of the net. I had scored the perfect hat trick: one left foot, one right foot, and one header. England had become world champions. My fortune on that day to score a hat trick, the only one ever scored in the history of the World Cup in a final, would become more and more talked about and significant.
Truthfully, in each World Cup since, I have quietly hoped that no one would score a hat trick and for my record to last at least for my lifetime. I'm very old now, 81 in December, and unless by then someone has scored one in the World Cup final in Qatar it's quite likely I will go to my grave with it.
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