Hand of God match was fan's first of 11 World Cups

Forty years after watching Diego Maradona deploy the "Hand of God" from high in the Azteca stands, an England fan recalls the moment he saw history happen.

As England meet Argentina again in the World Cup semi-finals on Wednesday, Paul Dubberley told the BBC about the first of his 11 World Cups - a journey that began with a £6 ticket.

"It was fantastic. The atmosphere in the stadium was brilliant. Being at the Azteca itself was kind of an experience", said the fan, from Walsall, West Midlands.

The 67-year-old described watching Peter Shilton chase after the referee in Mexico, but said England fans inside the stadium were unaware what had happened.

Dubberley travelled to Mexico City in 1986 for his first World Cup with a "ridiculously cheap" ticket to the Estadio Azteca, where the controversial goal helped Argentina to a 2-1 quarter-final victory.

He told BBC Radio WM: "In those days it was very cheap. You just bought the ticket at the ticket counter.

"We got a ticket for the final – some guy in an Arsenal shirt walked past us when we were going to buy a ticket for a game, and he said, 'If you go to that window, there you can get a ticket for the final.'

"We went round, four tickets to the final, about 10 quid each, and it was so much easier."

The lifelong supporter has now followed England at 11 World Cups, travelling to all three group matches in the United States this summer before returning to support the team for the quarter-final in Miami.

Speaking about the historic moment, he said fans "couldn't tell what happened".

"We were kind of up in the gods ourselves a little bit. We didn't know he had handballed it in at that time.

"It was only later on when we kind of watched it back on the TV and saw the news that we found out what had gone on. There's no replays, no big screens, so it's a bit different.

"We lost, we were out anyway, but it just made it that much harder to swallow really."

Dubberley said the result was "disappointing", and he had felt angry at first.

He said: "There's nothing you can do about it, you have to move on and we were out but we managed to get tickets for the final so we still went and watched them in the final against West Germany.

"It's 40 years on, it's definitely time to get over it, really. I think to most people, it's a moment in history that people remember."

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More on this story

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• 'Animals', Hand of God and Beckham - Argentina and England's World Cup rivalry
• 'I witnessed Maradona's Hand of God' - a goal still talked about 40 years on