| Football At The 1924 Summer Olympics |
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BACKGROUND 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 was not 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 {Link without Title} , 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 ".'' Once they arrived, once they started playing they would 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'' {Link without Title} . Despite all this little was known about them; they had never played outside of South America and their international experience had mainly been spent travelling across the harbour from Buenos Aires to Montevideo {Link without Title} . 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 . Rather than considering dropping players they had sacked their manager Dr Veljko Ugrinic instead (following a 4-1 wiping by those Austrians in Zagreb ) but would find his replacement Todor Sekulic just as hapless {Link without Title} . 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 [http://rsssf.com/tablesz/zwit-intres.html#05]. He and they would 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 [http://www.fifa.com/tournaments/archive/tournament=512/edition=197020/overview.html]. 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 {Link without Title} . 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, ; 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 '' {Link without Title} 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 would 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 had 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 "'' {Link without Title} . THE GOLD MEDAL In the other semi-final between Switzerland and Sweden the Swiss, luckily, 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 {Link without Title} . TRIVIA
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