History Of The Soccer World Cup - Part 1
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1872 – The worlds first ever international soccer match was played between Scotland and England in Glasgow. The game was viewed as a success.
1884 – Building on the back of the success of the first international clashes between British sides, the British Home Championship was formed. At this time, International soccer was scarcely played around the world.
1904 – FIFA founded.
1906 – FIFA decided to try and arrange an international soccer tournament outside of the Olympics. Little is known of the idea, other than FIFA described the competition as having failed.
1908 – Soccer was officially recognised as part of the Olympics, although the event was only for amateur players. Great Britain were the first winners.
1909 – Sir Thomas Lipton organised a tournament in Turin called the Sir Thomas Lipton Trophy. The tournament was not one for nations, but rather professional clubs that represented their nation. The English FA refused to participate. Lipton therefore invited West Auckland, an amateur team from the North East to represent England and they duly won the tournament, repeating the feat in 1911.
1914 – FIFA recognised the Olympic soccer tournament as a “world soccer championship for amateurs” and took over responsibility organising the event.
1920 – In the 1920 Summer Olympics in Antwerp the first inter-continental soccer tournament was held when Egypt joined thirteen European sides. Hosts Belgium were declared winners.
1924 – 1928 –The continuing success of the Summer Olympic soccer tournament (won in both 1924 and 1928 by Uruguay) saw FIFA start to investigate the possibility of staging its own international tournament outside of the Olympics. On 28th May 1928, the FIFA Congress announced it was to stage a World Championship organised by FIFA. Uruguay, as double Olympic champions and seeing as the country was celebrating a centenary of independence in 1930, were elected as the first hosts of the inaugural World Cup finals tournament.
1930 – Despite the national soccer associations of selected FIFA nations were invited to send a team, the choice of Uruguay as hosts saw resistance to the idea from many European sides, due mainly to the issues of travel. No European country pledged to send a team until two months before the competition was due to start. In the face of European apathy, Rimet finally managed to persuade teams from Belgium, France, Romania and Yugoslavia make the long trip. The first finals would consist of 13 nations in total, the four from Europe, seven from South America and two from North America. Hosts nation Uruguay won the first final, defeating bitter rivals Argentina 4-2 in Montevideo.
1932 – Soccer was dropped from the Summer Olympic games. It returned in 1936, but the competition was now being overshadowed by the World Cup.
1934 – Italy hosted and won the second World Cup finals competition, defeating Czechoslovakia 2-1 in the final in Rome. Sixteen teams competed in the finals, but holders Uruguay were conspicuous by their absence part in protest at European teams not turning up in 1930, and partly because they feared their best players would stay on in Europe after the finals.
1938 – The choice of France as hosts for the competition enraged South American sides, two of whom, Uruguay and Argentina, refused to enter the competition. Spain were unable to participate due to the civil war in the country. 16 nations qualified, but in March 1938 the Nazi’s Anschluss with Austria, saw the Austrian’s withdraw leaving 15 nations. Italy defeated Hungary 4-2 in the final to become the first team to successfully defend the trophy and the first team to win it twice. It would also be the last finals for twelve years due to the second world war.
1950 – Brazil had been elected hosts of the 1950 World Cup finals and this tournament was the first to include British teams and also saw the return of Uruguay to the competition. It would be a magnificent return for Uruguay who went on to defeat host nation Brazil 2-1 in the final, much against the weight of expectation of the entire Brazilian nation. This World Cup was the first world cup to be organised in a group system – previously it had been a knockout cup competition. The final game of the final group stage saw Brazil take on Uruguay only needing a draw to be World Cup Winners, however in front of nearly 200,000 people, the visitors snatched a late goal through Ghiggia to lift the trophy for the second time.
1954 – the 1954 finals were hosted by Switzerland and proved to be memorable for many reasons, not least the “Magnificent Magyars”, Hungary who had not long previously decimated England at Wembley 6-3 and then repeated the humiliation a few months later 7-1 in Budapest. The Hungarians were hot favourites to win the trophy and cruised into the final where they faced a West German team that they had already beaten 8-3 in the earlier stages of the competition. Despite going 2-0 down early on, the Germans battled back to secure a fantastic 3-2 victory and lift their first World Cup trophy.
1958 – The finals of 1958 were hosted by Sweden and saw the emergence of a 17 year old superstar Brazilian by the name of Pele. However even his goalscoring feats were outstripped by Frenchman Just Fontaine who scored a record 13 goals during the finals, a record which still stands to this day. Sweden reached the final but were defeated 5-2 by a Brazil team that finally laid to rest the disappointment of losing on home soil eight years previously.
1962 – The World Cup returned to South America in 1962 to Chile, but it was not the most auspicious event. If the 1958 finals were christened the “friendly finals”, the 1962 event was clearly not, including the infamous “Battle of Santiago” where Chile and Italy fought out, literally at times, a 2-0 victory for the home team. England reached the quarter finals were they were undone by the brilliance of Garrincha for Brazil in a 3-1 defeat. Hosts Chile reached the semi finals, but it was Brazil who trumphed, defeating Czechoslovakia 3-1 in the final in Santiago.
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