Aside from Hagi, the Romania team of the 1990s also included a legion of sacred names which, all these years later, are still more famous back home than anyone currently wearing our famously bright yellow shirts. That's because no squad since has come close to making us as happy as they did. Russia 2018 will mark the 20th anniversary of Romania's last journey to the World Cup finals.

That France '98 team made it to the Last 16 before being knocked out by the tournament's top-scorer, Davor Suker, and the rest of his Croatian side. But the most iconic moment of that tournament had happened five days earlier. After confirming their place in the second round, with wins over Colombia and England, and with one group game to spare, feeling confident, the entire team bleach­ed their hair.

Of course, it was meant to inspire a sense of team spirit, but if you ask then-national team coach, Anghel Iordănescu, an entirely different sort of spirit was roused. "We've angered God," Iordănescu told the press after the team drew the last group games against Tunisia, before being knocked out by Croatia.

"At a strategy meeting two days before our first game against Colombia, we asked Mr Iordănescu if he'd be willing to shave his head if we qualified after two matches," former international Andrian Ilie tells me. "And when he agreed, we decided that if he actually went through with it, we'd dye ours, too. But first we had to beat Colombia and England."