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November 5

Wembley scoreboard detail

Hello. During the replay of Zola's goal the scoreboard of the old Wembley is framed for a moment, you can see in the video link below, at min. 24:43. The match in question was England-Italy, a match valid for the 1998 World Cup qualifiers, played on Feb. 12, 1997. Was anyone -maybe I am claiming too much- there in London that night to watch the match? If you noticed, after Zola's decisive goal, did the latter's name appear on the scoreboard immediately after the mark? Forgive the curious question. Thank you very much. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XD8QseNBORM&t=1496s 5.95.197.140 (talk) 20:24, 5 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Yes it is a bit of a long shot; not many of the regular editors here live in England, and I'm not sure that any have an interest in football. You might have more luck at a dedicated England supporters' forum, like this or this for example. Alansplodge (talk) 14:10, 6 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I think in fact a fair proportion of regular responders do live in England and are interested in football, certainly to the extent of watching England's World Cup qualifying matches on TV – but I also think it's unlikely that even spectators at the match would have noticed at the time exactly when the scorer's name appeared on the scoreboard (their attention would have been elsewhere), and even more unlikely that they would remember such a trivial detail 26 years later. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.2.5.208 (talk) 19:34, 6 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

Would that have been standard procedure? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 22:48, 8 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

It depends on how technically advanced the scoreboard was, which is probably what has piqued the OP's interest. Alansplodge (talk) 11:46, 9 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

How old was that scoreboard? ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 23:34, 9 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

No idea, but as the stadium was due to be demolished, it may not have been state-of-the-art. Alansplodge (talk) 12:35, 10 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

It may be more an issue of when the software for creating the graphics on the video screen was last updated. Technologically, it was feasible in 1997 to have a control by which the operator would just have to enter the scorer's squad number and the software would do the rest. --Lambiam 12:36, 10 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

American stadiums had primitive electronic message boards and the like starting in at least the 1960s. ←Baseball Bugs ^{What's up, Doc?} carrots→ 23:51, 10 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]

I think your best option (and it's a slim chance) is to contact the (new) Wembley Stadium via the 'Contact us' link at the bottom of the front page of their website (link at the bottom of the Wikipedia article's infobox) and ask if they have any archival records of the old stadium, and if anyone would be able and willing to try to find out what you want to know. {The poster formerly known as 87.81.230.195} 94.2.5.208 (talk) 01:29, 11 November 2023 (UTC)[reply]