Everything about Football At The 1924 Summer Olympics totally explained
At the
1924 Summer Olympics held in
Paris,
Uruguay dominated the Football (soccer) tournament winning the Gold.
Amateur Status
In 1921, the Belgium Football Association first allowed for payments to players for time lost from work; in the months that followed four other Associations (
Switzerland and
Italy amongst them) permitted similar subsidies.
The Football Association, perhaps, with foresight considered their statement of 1884 to be one which
FIFA should hereafter follow. They had stated: "Any player registered with this Association ... receiving remuneration ... of any sort above ... necessary expenses actually paid, shall be considered to be a professional."
In 1923 the four British Associations sought an assurance that FIFA accept this definition; the four FIFA representatives on the
International Football Association Board refused and, consequently, both
Great Britain and
Denmark withdrew their footballers from representing their nations at the 1924 Olympic Games.
Entries
In
Association Football (1960),
Bernard Joy wrote about the 1912 Games that the authorities in
Sweden "had debated for a long time whether to include football ... because its popularity wasn't yet world wide". Twelve years later, in Paris, football had become so important to the Games that a 1/3 of the income generated came from football. In terms of international development these Games signalled the first participation in a major Championship of a team from South America, a continent which would provide the main competition to Europe from that moment on.
In Paris Uruguay, who had paid their third class passage to Paris and gone on a dazzlingly successful tour of Spain beforehand
(External Link
), would join as many as 18 European teams; the United States, Turkey and Egypt. In terms of the numbers of participating teams this would be the biggest international football tournament until the
1982 FIFA World Cup in Spain.
The Uruguayans had comfortably won the
South American Championship by maximum points in the December of the previous year to qualify for the tournament as their continent's sole participants; defeating bitter rivals Argentina 2-0 in the final game in which
Pedro Petrone scored half way through the first half. They would bring to Paris a revolution in ideas. Joy would write:
"A doctor and a physical expert were as important elements of the staff as the coach himself. They saw to it that their charges reached perfect physical condition. They were kept that way by staying away from the attractions of Paris at a villa in the quiet village of Argenteuil". Once they arrived, once they started playing they'd amaze and attract. The way their forwards would pass the ball between themselves would captivate, belittling their early doubters. In Paris
Jose Leandro Andrade would be dubbed
La Marveille Noire (External Link).
Despite all this little was known about them; they'd never played outside of South America and their international experience had mainly been spent travelling across the harbour from
Buenos Aires to
Montevideo.
It is understandable therefore that, given the general lack of knowledge of the Uruguayans that the Italians and the Hungarians should have been considered favourites, however, both, though strong, had suffered a difficult season.
Italy, having remained unbeaten since 1922, now found themselves beaten 4-0 by an early incantation of
Hugo Meisl's
Wunderteam (who, tantalisingly, would absent themselves from the Games).
With just six weeks to go before the Games Italy had been walloped 7-1 by Hungary.).
Other than dropping
Giampiero Combi,
Vittorio Pozzo wouldn't make major changes; Italy wouldn't prevail.
The Hungarians had just come off a good run of results in the previous year, but had been beaten, convincingly, by the Swiss in the days leading up to the Games;
Max Abegglen, who had only been playing international football for two years, scoring his 7th international goal that day for the Swiss.
He and they'd become quite a feature of the Games. The Swiss, ironically, had been on the verge of withdrawing from the Games due to their continued success. The team's train ticket was valid for only 10 days and their money had run out. An appeal by a newspaper,
Sport, brought in the needed funds.
Entering for the second time
Egypt would cause a shocking defeat in their opening game; their true worth exposed not only by the drubbing that eventually signalled their exit but by the comprehensive defeats they experienced on a short European tour after the Games.
The concept of warm-up matches lay far into the future.
Both finalists from the previous Games would be present;
Belgium being afforded a bye into the first round; the Czechs drawn against
Turkey in the Preliminary Round.
Tournament
The Games competition was assisted by a Preliminary Round which featured the silver medallists from the 1920 Games,
Spain in a game with
Italy. Since that time Spain had only lost once and that by a single goal away to
Belgium and had drawn 0-0 with the Italians in March
1924 (External Link). There was hardly anything between themselves and Italy when they met, this time, at the
Colombes Stadium;
Pedro Vallana's own goal handing victory to Italy.
Otherwise there were wildly lopsided results in the opening round. Hungary put five past Poland, the Swiss sent poor Lithuania on their way, 9-0. But the big talking point was the play of the Uruguayans
[they] played first-rate football, combining speed, skill and perfect ball-control. By marrying short passing to intelligent positional play, they made the ball do all the work, and so kept their opponents on the run wrote Joy. The Uruguayans sailed past Yugoslavia by seven clear goals, then overcame the United States by three goals to nil; only after the Americans had shut bolt their defence. Their team was fundamentally that with which they'd dominate World football for the next 6 years.
In the first round
Czechoslovakia (following their ill-judged decision to walk off the field in 1920) enhanced their reputation as Olympic 'bad sports' during an ill-tempered fixture against an equally unforgiving Swiss; the game went fruitlessly to extra-time. One Czech was sent off, and the Norwegian referee had to call for order during a break. For the replay, Abegllen took the captain's duties and all was different; Switzerland winning by the single goal. Otherwise there were two big shocks, the first went
Egypt's way; 3-0 to the good against
Hungary. The second saw
Sweden annihilate the reigning Gold medallists, Belgium, quite improbably, 8-1.
Oscar Verbeeck's own goal set the Swedes on their way;
Sven Rydell's hat-trick the feature of the match.
The Swedish outside-left
Rudolf Kock (who would become chairman of the selectors in
1948 working alongside
George Raynor), would have another fine game against Egypt where Sweden won 5-0. France and Holland had been similarly dominant in the first round but that was put into perspective when Uruguay beat France 5-1 to claim a semi-final place.
In another quarter-final
Italy went out to
Switzerland disputing a winner by
Max Abegglen, who converted a break-away goal. The Italians protested that he'd been off-side. The referee
Johannes Mutters, refused to alter the decision of his linesman; a jury upheld the judgement.
There was further dispute in the semi-final where Holland (coached by the old Blackburn Rovers' Cup hero
William Townley) took a first half lead against
Uruguay through
Feyenoord's
Pijl Kees. With twenty minutes to go
Pedro Cea scored an equaliser and with less than ten
Georges Vallatt, the French referee, awarded Uruguay a penalty. Suddenly bedlam. FIFA reports:
"the Netherlands protested the ruling of a penalty kick that turned out to be the winning goal but then Uruguay protested against the Olympic Committee's selection of a Dutch referee for the final. To appease the South Americans, the committee pulled the name of a final referee out of a hat and picked out a Frenchman, Marcel Slawick" (External Link).
The Gold Medal
In the other semi-final between
Switzerland and
Sweden the Swiss prevailed.
In the final the Swiss proved no match, ultimately, for the Uruguayans whose two goals in the second half put paid to their opponent's ambitions, Uruguay eventually prevailing 3-0. Interest in the final had been considerable, such was the draw of the Uruguayan side; 60,000 watched and 10,000 were locked out
(External Link).
Trivia
- Sweden, surprisingly, won Bronze. Their 8-1 defeat of the reigning champions, Belgium, in the opening round is still considered the biggest upset in World football by criteria laid down by ELO. (External Link)
- Some of the games took place at the Vélodrome de Vincennes.
- The lap of honour (or previously called "Olympic turn"), the celebration ritual that any proclaimed champion team do when winning a tournament, was invented by Uruguay team after winning this Olympic title, to salute the attendance by running all around the athletics field.
- Uruguay's Pedro Petrone was two days shy of his 19th birthday when he accepted his gold medal; still the youngest football gold-medallist in the history of the Games.
Men's tournament event
Further Information
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