Soccer in Sun and Shadow

The 1966 World Cup

The military was bathing Indonesia in blood, half a million, a million, who-knows-how-many dead, and General Suharto was inaugurating his long dictatorship by murdering the few reds, pinks or questionables still alive. Other officers were overthrowing N’Krumah, president of Ghana and prophet of African unity, while their colleagues in Argentina were evicting President Illia by coup d’état.

For the first time in history a woman, Indira Gandhi, was governing India. Students were toppling Ecuador’s military dictatorship. The U.S. Air Force was bombing Hanoi with renewed vigor, but Americans were growing ever more convinced they should never have gone into Vietnam, let alone stayed, and should leave as soon as possible.

Truman Capote had just published In Cold Blood. García Márquez’s One Hundred Years of Solitude and Lezama Lima’s Paradiso were in the bookstores. The priest Camilo Torres was dying in battle in the mountains of Colombia, Che Guevara was riding his skinny Rocinante through Bolivia’s countryside, and Mao was unleashing the Cultural Revolution in China. Several atomic bombs were falling on the Spanish coast at Almería, sowing panic even though none of them went off. Well-informed sources in Miami were announcing the imminent fall of Fidel Castro, it was only a matter of hours.

In London, with Harold Wilson chewing his pipestem and celebrating victory at the polls, young women sporting miniskirts, Carnaby Street as fashion capital, and the entire world humming Beatles tunes, the eighth World Cup got under way.

This was the final World Cup for Garrincha and it was also a good-bye party for Mexican goalkeeper Antonio Carbajal, the only player to be in the tournament five times.

Sixteen teams took part: ten from Europe, five from the Americas, and, strange as it seems, North Korea. Astonishingly, the Koreans eliminated Italy with a goal by Pak, a dentist from the city of Pyongyang who played soccer in his spare time. On the Italian squad were no less than Gianni Rivera and Sandro Mazzola. Pier Paolo Pasolini used to say they played soccer in lucid prose interspersed with sparkling verse, but that dentist left them speechless.

For the first time the entire championship was broadcast live by satellite and, though in black and white, the whole world could watch the show put on by the referees. In the previous World Cup, European referees officiated at twenty-six matches; in this one, they ran twenty-four out of thirty-two. A German referee gave England the match against Argentina, while an English referee gave Germany the match against Uruguay. Brazil had no better luck: Pelé was hunted down and kicked with impunity by Bulgaria and Portugal, which knocked Brazil out of the championship.

Queen Elizabeth attended the final. She did not scream when players scored, but she did applaud discreetly. The World Cup came down to the England of Bobby Charlton, a man of fearful drive and marksmanship, and the Germany of Beckenbauer, who had just begun his career and was already playing with hat, gloves, and cane. Someone had stolen the Rimet Cup, but a dog named Pickles found it in a London garden, and the trophy reached the winners’ hands in time. England won 4–2. Portugal came in third, the Soviet Union fourth. Queen Elizabeth gave Alf Ramsey, the manager of the victorious team, a title of nobility, and Pickles became a national hero.

The ’66 World Cup was usurped by defensive tactics. Every team used the sweeper system with an extra defender by the goal line behind the fullbacks. Even so, Eusebio, Portugal’s African artilleryman, managed to pierce those impenetrable rear-guard walls nine times. Behind him on the list of leading scorers was Haller of Germany with six.