A unique collaboration between Howgate Shopping Centre, and Hampden Park’s Scottish FootballMuseum opens to the public next Wednesday 16th September 2015. The Howgate in Falkirk will become the first shopping centre in Scotland to host some of the prestigious museum’s incredible collection.
The exhibition “For Club and Country” charts the story of club and international football from its humble 19th century beginnings right up to the present day. A priceless collection of memorabilia, archive material and film footage will explain the amazing role that Falkirk folk have played in the internationalisation of the national game. From legendary home internationals and world record attendances at Hampden; the national sides attendance at World Cup football tournaments, to the record breaking transfer fees and other UK and European ‘firsts’ that happened right here in Falkirk. A packed exhibition includes activities for kids of all ages and The Scottish Football Hall of Fame containing footage of some of the greatest players that the country has ever produced.
The initiative is a partnership between Howgate, the Scottish Football Museum, Allied International UK, VisitFalkirk, and Falkirk agency Eden together with the Alzheimer Scotland Football Memories Project.
Visitors will have the chance to discover the identity of Falkirk’s most capped player, watch Jimmy Johnstone terrorise defences, and see Denis Law, Archie Gemmill, Kenny Dalglish and Jim Baxter in action.
The exhibition also tells the story of Falkirk’s national and international football heritage including the rarely known story of the Falkirk born man who to this day remains a legend of Italian international football the Barghigiano Johnny Moscardini
The exhibition will be located in a unit in the Howgate Shopping Centre and will be free to the public.
Contacts:
Douglas Cameron Eden douglas@edencg.co.uk Tel: 01324 633 785
Margaret Foy Howgate Margaret@intohowgate.co.uk Tel: 01324 631 985
www.scottishfootballmuseum.org.uk
http://www.intohowgate.co.uk/ http://www.ellandi.com
Giovanni, or Johnny as he became known, was born in Falkirk in 1897 and is the only Scots-born male player to have played for Italy. He learned to kick a ball in the streets near his parents’ café in Manor Street, which still carries the name today. Johnny had dual nationality, but when World War One broke out he made a decision which would change his life forever. He joined the Italian Army and served as a machine gunner, being seriously wounded when he got shrapnel in his elbow at the Battle of Caporetto on the Austrian front. He was sent to Sicily to recuperate and when he got there he organised a football team. On returning to Barga, his ancestral home in Tuscany, he continued to play and was spotted by a scout from Lucchese, then a Serie A team.He won the first of his International caps in November 1921 against Switzerland in Geneva. He scored the Italian goal after only ten minutes of his debut. Johnny won a total of nine Italian caps between 1921 and 1925 and scored seven goals – not a bad return by any standards.
Johnny died in 1985, aged 88, and his name lives on in Barga, where the Stadio Comunale di Barga is known as the Moscardini Stadium. Lots of Johnny’s old team-mates were contacted and were present at the naming ceremony in 1979.
Tag: nazionale, jhonny moscardini, falikirk, Hampden Park, Howgate Shopping Centre, scozia
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