World Soccer Presents

And so ends the World Soccer Presents series. After 13 souvenir edition bookazines, which have included, among others, the game’s greatest rivalries, iconic teams, special issues on Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, and the Premier League and Champions League eras, what better way to bow out than to chronicle the history of the greatest soccer tournament of them all? In 2021, to accompany the ground-breaking Euro 2020 finals, we compiled an anthology of the European Championship, so it was only fitting to close out the World Soccer Presents collection by recounting every World Cup tournament ahead of what will be an equally historic finals in Qatar. Having launched in 1960, World Soccer has reported on 15 of the 21 previous World Cups but, helpfully, Keir Radnedge in 1978 and Iain Macleod in…

The first World Cup took place in 1930, hosted in Uruguay, and it has since become the world’s greatest sporting event. The trophy would be named after FIFA president Jules Rimet, its most famous founding father, and the need for a true world championship stemmed from a succession of successful Olympic tournaments in the 1920s and the irreversible onset of professionalism. It was an age of comparative innocence, and when France beat Mexico on that mid-summer Sunday in the now demolished Estadio Pocitos in the Uruguayan capital – with Frenchman Lucien Laurent scoring the World Cup’s inaugural goal – history was in the making. Hosts Uruguay seemed to have everything going their way. They had dominated the 1924 and 1928 Olympic tournaments, and had offered to pay all expenses of World…

Whether it is a true story, or merely apocryphal, it deserves to be told here as the key to all that happened when Mussolini’s Italy staged the 1934 finals. “General Vaccaro,” Mussolini is said to have addressed the head of the Olympic Committee, “Italy must win the World Cup.” “We’ll do everything possible, Duce,” replied Vaccaro. “General,” repeated Mussolini. “I don’t think you quite understood me. I said Italy must win the World Cup.” And Italy did just that – with the aid of three Argentinians, midfielder Luis Monti, and wingers Enrique Guaita and Raimundo Orsi. Their team was based on Juventus, but they also had at their head one of the greatest of managers in Vittorio Pozzo. Pozzo was the first manager to think deeply about how to bring the best out of his…

France hosted the 1938 tournament, but the storm clouds of war hung over Europe with impending doom; Spain was already firmly in the grip of civil war. The German military machine had annexed Austria – and nine of its World Cup squad – with the Austrians having to withdraw. Argentina would not compete and Uruguay remained absent. But Vittorio Pozzo brought a much changed and arguably better Azzurri side; inside-forwards Giuseppe Meazza and Giovanni Ferrari, and right-back Eraldo Monzeglio (though the latter was omitted after the first game) only retained from 1934. Holders Italy began against Norway in Marseille, but after Pietro Ferraris’ early goal they found themselves run ragged by a Norwegian strikeforce that caused many problems. It was only through the agility and bravery of Aldo Olivieri, who by…

Post-war, nations needed time to reorganise and it was 1950 before the World Cup took shape again. Brazil, with a new, showpiece 200,000-capacity stadium in Rio de Janeiro – the Maracana – hosted the tournament and took the first steps towards immortality. It was a strange tournament. Although Uruguay returned to the fold – back for the first time since winning the trophy in 1930 – Germany had not been readmitted to FIFA, Argentina (at odds with their Brazilian counterparts), sullenly refused to participate, and the great central European powers of the pre-war era were all missing. Austria in particular stood out because they alleged their side was too young, but by 1951 they had one of the most attractive teams in Europe. Hungary, preparing soon to astonish the world of…

The 1954 finals came to the land of clocks, cowbells and Alps. And though Switzerland’s World Cup was not the best organised in history, it has valid claims on being one of the best. The 1950s was one of European soccer’s greatest eras and Hungary – arguably the finest-ever international side – arrived in Switzerland as the hottest favourites the tournament has ever known. In fact, Hungary were more than favourites. They appeared stone cold certainties. Unbeaten in four years, Olympic champions, the team who had ended England’s resistance at home by 6-3, and then, just to rub it in, won 7-1 in Budapest…this was the team of all the talents, one of the greatest of all time. And they were recognised as such at the time. It seemed impossible that…