Cameroon at Italia ‘90: Roger Milla and the Legend of the Indomitable Lions - Part One
It Was What It Was : The Football History Podcast
The Overlap
4.9 • 667 Ratings
🗓️ 1 April 2025
⏱️ 48 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
This week on It Was What It Was, Rob Draper and Jonathan Wilson look back at one of the most iconic footballing stories of all time: Cameroon’s 1990 World Cup.
Jonathan and Rob look at the chaotic preparations behind Cameroon's campaign, discussing last-minute squad upheaval, internal conflicts between teammates, and the unexpected recall of a man who would become a legend: Roger Milla.
In the build up to the tournament's opening game against defending champions Argentina, there were turbulent training camps, political interferences, and a complete lack of confidence in the squad. That would all change in the summer to come...
Join us on Friday for Part Two.
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00:00 Pre-Game Nerves and Disorganization
01:02 Introduction to the 1990 Cameroon Team
01:25 Historical Context of African Teams in the World Cup
02:26 The Dramatic Campaign of Cameroon 1990
04:40 The Goalkeeper Dilemma
07:25 African Football's Struggles and Triumphs
14:37 Colonial Impact on African Football
17:44 Cameroon's Chaotic Road to the World Cup
24:09 African Players in European Football
24:58 Cameroon's Discontent in the 1990s
26:02 The Build-Up to the 1990 World Cup
31:43 Roger Milla's Unexpected Return
40:07 Goalkeeper Rivalries and Team Dynamics
43:33 Pre-Match Chaos and Last-Minute Changes
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Transcript
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| 0:00.0 | I said five hours before the first game with the World Cup. |
| 0:10.9 | How can we play? |
| 0:12.4 | So I was trying to reach my wife to tell her things had changed. |
| 0:15.4 | She'd gone shopping with the wives of the other players, |
| 0:18.1 | and this was before mobile phones. |
| 0:20.3 | I said, no way. I had no confidence |
| 0:22.5 | in the coach. The Federation and the Minister's Sports, seven or eight people were telling me I had |
| 0:27.2 | to play, and I was saying, I don't feel ready. Well, welcome to it was what it was with me, Rob Draper. |
| 0:33.9 | Here was Jonathan Wilson. That was the great Thomas and Connell and the Cameroonian |
| 0:38.2 | goalkeeper talking about the opening day of the 1990 World Cup finals. Still one of the great days, |
| 0:45.2 | one of the great games of World Cup finals, certainly opening games, a World Cup finals against |
| 0:50.0 | Argentina and one of the great World Cup campaigns remembered fondly around the globe |
| 0:55.4 | because it is one of the iconic African campaigns of the World Cup. |
| 0:59.0 | I think still one of the best performances of an African team in the World Cup. |
| 1:02.8 | We are looking at the Cameroon team of 1990. |
| 1:06.5 | England had a little bit of a scrape with them in the quarter finals. |
| 1:09.6 | Jonathan, you're a bit of an expert on this. You've written about it. You've met members of the team. Introduce us to Cameroon 1990 and why they're so important. Yeah, I mean, you're right. It is one of the great campaigns. I mean, still, they were the first African team to get to the quarter final. There's only three teams since have got to the quarter final. Morocco, the last walk-up were the first African team to get to the quarterfinal. There's only three teams since have got to the quarterfinal. |
| 1:29.2 | Morocco, the last walk-up were the first African team to get to the semifinal. |
| 1:32.5 | But the only other two were Ghana in 2010 and Senegal in 2002. |
| 1:36.4 | So getting of the quarterfinals is a big deal. |
| 1:39.1 | The fact they were the first obviously makes it bigger. |
| 1:42.2 | I think there'd been a creeping sense among people who were prepared to notice |
... |
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