NETHERLANDS 2-3 SCOTLAND

Despite the loss of the inspirational Johan Cruyff from their 1974 team, the Netherlands went to Argentina for the 1978 World Cup strongly fancied to go one step further than four years earlier and claim their first World Cup. Scotland also fancied their chances of a good run in the competition, and were certainly expecting to accompany the Netherlands through to the second stage. However, Scotland's chances had almost been destroyed by two poor performances to start the competition. They had been beaten 3-1 by Peru and only drawn 1-1 with Iran, and with Peru and the Netherlands tied at the top of the group Scotland found themselves needing to beat the Dutch by three clear goals to stay in the tournament.

The task seemed well beyond them eleven minutes before half-time. Rob Rensenbrink converted a penalty for the Netherlands, the 1000th goal in World Cup history, and Scotland needed to score four. Scotland's equaliser came just a minute before the interval, Joe Jordan setting up Kenny Dalglish to give the Scots some hope, but it would still take an astonishing performance in the second half to take them through.

Just minutes after the restart, Scotland were awarded a penalty of their own. Archie Gemmill converted, and Scotland had the lead. Their fans started to believe that they could achieve the seemingly impossible, and the dream appeared to be heading towards reality midway through the second half when Gemmill scored again. Dribbling past several Dutch defenders before curling a wonderful strike past Jan Jongbloed, Gemmill had given the Scots a 3-1 lead and they needed just one more goal to reach the second round.

However, the Netherlands were too good a team to go down without a fight. Staring at the possibility of an embarrasing first round elimination they picked themselves up quickly and just four minutes later captain Ruud Krol set up Johnny Rep to pull a crucial goal back and destroy Scotland's momentum. The Scots had just 18 minutes to score twice more, and this time they had no answer. Despite the most famous win in their World Cup history, Scotland went out on goal difference, their fourth first round exit in four World Cup appearances. The Netherlands went on to reach another final, where only the width of the post in stoppage time denied them victory before they fell to hosts Argentina in extra-time.