Three years before he became the world’s most expensive footballer - overtaking Diego Maradona and Ruud Gullit - Lajos Detari stuck the ball in the Shamrock Rovers net and then stuck his fingers up at Harry Kenny.
Detari was a member of the Honved side that took on the Hoops in the European Cup in 1985.
It’s the last time Rovers - who are in Budapest on Thursday to take on Ferencvaros in their Europa League play-off - faced Hungarian opposition.
Honved were a top side at the time and were famously the club of Ferenc Puskas for 13 years before his move to Real Madrid, as well as Barcelona legend Sandor Kocsis.
In Budapest during the 1980s, Detari was the posterboy for Hungarian football.
After moving from Honved to Eintracht Frankfurt in 1987, he was snapped up by Olympiacos - run by Bank of Crete owner George Koskotas - for €8.7m.
The fee eclipsed those paid by Napoli for Maradona and Milan for Gullit - and he remains the fourth most expensive signing in the Greek club’s history.
A far cry from his 1985 gesture, borne out of frustration and aimed at Rovers man Kenny.
“It was funny, Jim McLaughlin never used to mess around with the team in any shape or form. It was always 4-4-2,” Kenny recalled.
“But he had heard that this fella Detari was very special and that he played in the middle of the pitch.
“So he asked me to play in the middle of the pitch, just to pick up this fella and do a man-marking job on him.
“On a couple of fronts it was a bit unusual. I had never played for Rovers in the middle of the pitch - I was always known as a right-back.
“And Jim had Noel Larkin, who was a forward, playing at right-back instead of me.
“Detari was very good, but I did quite well on him.
“He scored that evening, late in the game. I think it was a free-kick.
“He basically gave me the fingers after it, because I was pretty dogged on him all night and was going well on him.
“But when he stuck the free-kick in, it was all over. They won 2-0 on the night.
“Then he got two then in the second-leg and we lost 3-1.
“I wasn’t man marking him that time. We were chasing the game a little bit, so McLaughlin went back to the standard 4-4-2.”
Kenny might have been marking the man who went on to win 61 caps for Hungary - but he didn’t get Detari’s jersey at the final whistle.
It still takes pride of place in Paul Doolin’s collection of opposition shirts.
“I was only after joining Rovers that year and we drew Honved, the army team in Budapest,” recalled Doolin, who 12 years later played for Bohemians against Ferencvaros.
“When we went it was a little bit different to now, where you travel the day before a game. We went on the Sunday or Monday and the game was Wednesday.
“We stopped off in Zurich, I think, and we trained on the way to it. Then we continued on to Budapest.
“The night before, we attended a game there, a league game with Ferencvaros and someone else, I can’t remember the other team.
“I can’t really remember much about that league game. I just remember there was a lot of booing aimed at the referee.
“But our own game was tough and it might have been even tougher, because prior to it Dermot Keely was a doubt.
“We were in a pre-season tournament and we played Atletico Madrid, and he got a belt.
“He broke three ribs. He did well to play in the game.”
While Honved were the army team, the make-up of the crowd surprised Kenny.
“The funny thing about the game was there was nothing but soldiers at the match,” he said.
“There didn’t seem to be any normal punters supporting their team.
“I don’t think there was a huge crowd by any means, but the only ones there were soldiers, which was really unusual to us.”
Rovers got around Budapest with the help of Joe Veselsky, who was born in Trnava, in what is now Slovakia but was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire when he was born in 1918.
Veselsky fought the Nazis in Czecoslovakia and arrived in Ireland in 1949, where he became a regular visitor to Milltown to watch Shamrock Rovers, before he was later associated with UCD.
“Joe came over with us. He was involved and he was a friend of the Kilcoynes (Rovers owners), so he was our interpreter. He showed us around,” said Kenny.
“He could speak Hungarian. He was a very bright man. He helped us around the place.”
Veselsky could do nothing about Rovers’ fortunes on the pitch, however.
“They were decent, they were a good team. Detari was the standout player,” Kenny continued.
“We did reasonably well over there, but Detari was a fabulous footballer, he really was.
“The free-kick did it for me. He gave me the fingers and I just smiled back at him, because I was trying to kick him and do all sorts during the game.
“I’m not blowing my own trumpet, but he didn’t do much in the game. The free-kick was fabulous though.
“He might have given me the fingers because he was frustrated, but he had the last laugh.”
READ NEXT:
Rory McIlroy expected to attend crunch meeting with Tiger Woods and PGA Tour's top stars
Finbarr Cullen reflects on Offaly's stunning rags to riches Leinster win 25 years on
Jurgen Klopp delivers sobering verdict on Darwin Nunez's headbutt and red card
Peter Casey credits Limerick teammate Barry Murphy for shortening cruciate journey
Get the latest sports headlines straight to your inbox by signing up for free email alerts
