When he entered the game five minutes into extra-time, Edner Breton figured he would play maybe 10, perhaps 25 minutes before the winning goal was scored in a North American Soccer League playoff encounter against the Dallas Tornado. The Rochester Lancers midfielder did not have an inkling he would play almost the equivalent of a full game as a substitute in one of the most remarkable matches in soccer history.

When referee John DiSalvatore whistled the start of the game at 8pm, no one among the 8,302 spectators at old Aquinas Stadium in Rochester, New York, realized they would still be watching soccer – 176 minutes of it – until the witching hour. That’s when Lancers forward Carlos Metidieri mercifully ended everyone’s misery by scoring the winning goal, at 11.59pm on September 1 1971. Tuesday is the 44th anniversary of that marathon.

“It was sheer exhaustion, so you can imagine the other guys being dead the whole game, Carlos being one of them,” said Breton, who replaced Eli Durante and wound up playing 81 minutes as a sub. “When he scored that goal, it was no longer a relief for just us. It was joy, it was crazy, the feeling you get for winning a game like this. For the other team as well. Even though they lost, they were just happy it was over.”

Forward Manfred Seissler, who scored the Lancers’ lone goal in regulation, likened it to “being in the desert without water for four weeks.”

Sal DeRosa, the Rochester coach, labeled it the “most unbelievable game I have ever seen.”

In pure numbers, it was two hours, 56 minutes of soccer, or four minutes shy of two full games. That included 90 minutes of regulation and six 15-minute overtimes, as they were called back in the day. Oh, and each team had only two substitutions, which made tactical movements all that more precious.

The Lancers were the defending NASL champions, finished with the best record (13-5-6). Rochester boasted a talented roster that included Metidieri, the only player in NASL history to win back-to-back scoring crowns and MVP trophies, defenders Peter Short and Charlie Mitchell, and midfielders Frank Odoi and Francisco Escos.

The Tornado, which finished second in the Southern Division, had its array of Englishmen including goalkeeper Kenny Cooper, the father of Montreal Impact striker Kenny Cooper, John Best, Roy Turner, Dick Hall and Mike Renshaw, among others.

Cooper, who was only five weeks out off knee surgery, was the unlikely starter as regular Mirko Stojanovic, the NASL all-star keeper with a 0.69 goals-against average, was suspended by coach Ron Newman for insubordination.

“I was sitting in the locker room two days before the game,” Cooper said. “I had crutches with me and an argument broke out between Ron and Mirko. Ron suspended him on the spot and he looked at me and said, ‘Coops, you’re playing.’ I looked at him. ‘Ok.’ I hadn’t really trained. I still had somewhat of a limp. I taped up and I played.”

The first encounter of the three-game semi-final series was played at 20,000-seat Aquinas (later renamed Holleder Stadium). Fans were in a festive mood, eating pizza and reportedly passing around wine bottles.

Prior to the season, the NASL, under the urging of Lancers co-owner Charlie Schiano, changed its rules from having from penalty kicks to playing on to decide playoff games. Perhaps this was karma visiting Schiano’s team.

The Lancers drew first blood in the 18th minute when Seissler scored off Mitchell’s throw-in. The Tornado equalized in the 84th minute. An overlapping fullback Oreco floated in a right-wing cross that Tony McLoughlin leaped above two defenders and headed in past goalkeeper Claude Campos for a 1-1 deadlock.

Around 10pm the first extra-time kicked off. And the two sides played on and on and on.

Without any goals, the players became wearier and the threat of injury – pulled and cramped muscles – became greater.

“There came a time it didn’t matter any more,” Breton said. “Everyone was praying that something would happen, that someone would end our misery.”

How bad was it?

It was so bad that Dallas defender Gabbo Gavric’s thigh cramped in the 165th minute. Since both teams had used their allotted substitutions, Gavric stayed around the center circle, kicking the ball whenever it was close to him.

“It was so pathetic,” Breton said. “Every time the ball got near him, he touched the ball. You would hear an ovation from the fans.”

It was so bad that Metidieri had to use two pairs of shoes.

“It kind of wore out,” he said. “Aquinas Stadium in those days … the field wasn’t in such a great shape. I had Brazilian boots with plastic cleats on. I finally gave up. I got one of those shoes, rubber ones. I put it on. I think it helped. I got the goal after that.”

It was so bad that some fans apparently left the stadium, which was situated in a residential area, and returned after hearing of the never-ending match.

“I can recall a young boy sat behind the goal,” Cooper said. “I noticed him. I guess he left. He went home and saw the game was still on and came back.”

And there were some light moments as well. Metidieri related a story about DiSalvatore, the referee.

“He told Roberto [Lonardo, defender]: ‘Tell Carlos to go in the box and fall down so we give him a penalty kick and we’ll finish this game.’ He had to catch a flight, too. In those days, the poor guys were making 50-75 bucks a game. They [Dallas] were kicking my butt right and left. I couldn’t get into the box once.”

The Lancers pounded the Dallas goal, outshooting the visitors 28-11. Cooper, despite his injury, made 16 saves.

As the game inched closer to midnight, Metidieri remembered a throw-in near where his wife sat in the stands. “I told her to start cooking breakfast and that I might be there in a couple of hours,” he said.

Both coaches – Rochester’s Sal De Rosa and Dallas’s Ron Newman – pleaded several times with NASL commissioner Phil Woosnam, who sat close to the field, asking him to stop the game, have it decided by penalty kicks or even the number of corner kicks already taken. After the fifth extra-time, Woosnam said that he would wait and see.

He never had to make a decision.

Metidieri, nicknamed El Topolino (Italian for “Little Mouse”) because of his shifty moves, had something left in his 5ft 4in frame. He made two fakes, slotting the ball into the right corner of the net.

“I got the ball from the right side,” he said. “Ken Cooper went down and missed. I was coming from the left side and I just hit it right and it went into the net. I looked around and saw our players falling down.”

Cooper said “the ball went across the six-yard box. Carlos Metidieri came in and he hit it low down to my left. I want to say I got my hand on it. I want to say it hit the bottom of the post and spun just over. I thought I got enough of a touch. just inside the net. My first reaction was ‘Oh no, no – it can’t happen, because it’s going to go on for ever and ever.’”

Aquinas turned into sheer bedlam. Lancers players who hadn’t collapsed ran toward Metidieri.

“The next thing you know there was a pile of players,” Breton said. “I don’t know how he survived. We just fell on him. Nobody was feeling any pain at that time. It was sheer exhaustion mixed with ecstasy. It was one of the craziest feelings you would have ever experienced. I have played so many games since then. I never experienced any kind of a feeling like that. I’ve been through some great victories, some agonizing defeats.”

Then the fans ran on to the field, hoisting players onto their shoulders.

“It was like there was a pot of gold on the field and everyone wanted to get rich,” Metidieri said. “It was like we won the championship. They went wild.”

Many times after games the Lancers would go to a local bar or restaurant. With most closed, co-owner Pat Dinolfo took the team to a cafeteria at the Kodak company complex nearby. Metidieri said he was home by 3am.

“It was exciting, it was a great thing,” he said. “You wish you never had to go to sleep. You always relive the memories, the fans, the happiness. It as a lot of fun.”

That night Metidieri told reporters, “I think this will take the stuffing out of them. We shouldn’t have too much trouble with them in Dallas.”

Actually, he was dead wrong.

The Tornado regrouped and recorded a 3-1 victory at Franklin Field in Dallas three days later, forcing a third game in Rochester.

And like the first match, that confrontation went into extra-time and lasted 148 minutes, not early as long or excruciating for the players, but bad enough. For the record, Bobby Moffat scored the game-winning goal in that one to boost Dallas into the championship series with the Atlanta Chiefs.

As it turned out, the Tornado lost the first match, a 123-minute, 58-second affair as South African striker Kaiser “Boy-Boy” Motaung tallied the game-winner. Dallas won the next two games and its first and only NASL title.

“All the boys wear the championship ring. I still wear it today,” Cooper said.

“They’re great looking rings. People say: high school, college ring? No, championship ring. It’s got the games on there, and the dates on there. And then you say 176 minutes. ‘Are you kidding me?’ I say: ‘No it’s the longest game in the world.’ It’s still a talking point. As it should be.”

While the Lancers’ season was over, Breton’s involvement in marathon games did not end there. He performed in a third while wearing the uniform of the long-gone New York Apollos against the Boston Astros in the 1975 American Soccer League final.

That turned into yet another bizarre affair, a 157-minute, 30-second marathon at Memorial Field in Mount Vernon, New York, on September 21 1975.

The ASL was the second division to the NASL in those days and that game has been all but forgotten. In fact, league officials apparently tried to forget about the game as soon as possible. The 1976 ASL media guide did not mention a word about the game – no date, either – only a listing that there were dual champions.

Breton, a former Haitian international, did some homework and came up with these intriguing facts:

• The Apollos and Astros played three regular-season games that ended in ties (Breton tallied three times).

• 427 minutes and 30 seconds of soccer tied at 10-10.

The final was held in front of about 1,000 spectators, including the ASL commissioner, Bob Cousy, he of Boston Celtic basketball fame.



Like the game in Rochester four years prior, there was no way to determine the winner after 90 minutes except for a goal. Jose Neto had given Boston a 1-0 lead in the 15th minute with Dave Power equalizing in the 35th minute.

The game was stopped at 12.30am, one hour after the city curfew.



Cousy made a controversial ruling, telling reporters: “You don’t have to be a soccer expert to see that both teams deserve a share of that title. I don’t care what the precedent is for something like this.”

Breton said: “It was a disappointment for everybody. It was a bittersweet tie.”

A replay could be not scheduled because many of the Apollo players contract had expired that night.

“I don’t know if this ever happened before,” Breton said.

Given the laws of the game today, those soccer marathons, mercifully, will never happen again.



