Gold Medal Glory Days: Hungary’s Football Team at the Olympics Between 1952 and 1972
Gold Medal Glory Days: Hungary’s Football Team at the Olympics Between 1952 and 1972

Summary/Abstract: At half-time in the Olympic football final in Munich 40 years ago, Hungary were 1-0 up against Poland and 45 minutes from their third gold medal in a row. A double strike in the second half from Polish legend Kazimierz Deyna denied Hungary the hat-trick of golds in 1972, but the silver medal added to a remarkable and to this day unmatched haul of Olympic medals in football history. Between 1952 and 1972, Hungary were by a distance the number one Olympic football nation. They chalked up wins at the Games in Helsinki (1952), Tokyo (1964), and Mexico City (1968), as well as a silver in Munich (1972) and a bronze in Rome (1960). It is a record that places Hungary at the top of the medals table in the sport, yet few people are familiar with the story. The reason lies in the tournament’s status as poor relation to the World Cup. In almost all other Olympic sports, a gold medal represents the pinnacle of achievement in that sport. Not so with football, in which increasing professionalism between the wars resulted in a growing gap in quality between the Olympic tournament, nominally for amateurs, and the World Cup for pros which was launched in 1930.

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