Story of Puskas and His Team
Author: Kalman Toth M.A. M.PHIL.
Publisher:
Published: 2014-08-31
Total Pages: 220
ISBN-13: 9781501001086
DOWNLOAD EBOOKThe Hungarian Golden Team dominated world football (soccer) from 1950 to 1956. Its story is told with interviews, analysis and 120 photos. Sixty years is a lot of time. Social systems, big ideas, countries, and even empires shine and fall during this time. Among those who are in high positions, many feverishly try to leave a positive lasting impression on posterity, but so few people succeed in doing this. Because we, ordinary people, who do we like to remember? As the citizens of the ancient Greek city-states considered their triumphant athletes to be heroes, so we also feel that the elite athletes who ascended among us are our own.The triumph of the Hungarian Golden Team on the grass belongs to everyone, as everyone also experiences defeat as being a bit of their own. The fate of the Hungarian hero is tragic. No matter how close the light would shine before him, he stumbles at the very last step of his triumphal progress and in the end, he can not withstand those forces that shape the world. After a score of 6:3 achieved at Wembley Stadium, the original home of football (soccer in USA), a fallen nation that was humiliated multiple times could taste greatnes, uniqueness and invincibility again. Sixty years ago in Bern, Switzerland we could already feel the world famous victory as our own. That in the end it did not happen like this, that the crowning did not take place, we are looking for its causes to the present day. We are looking for it, because we, who were there on the field or were just listening to the broadcast on the radio, for us it still hurts that we did not become world champions. The sixteen-thousand inhabitants of Solothurn in Switzerland were also looking for its cause, who grew fond of the Golden Team who were living and training there during the three weeks of the World Cup. There is no other such lucky city in the world. The teams of Solothurn could play twice with the Golden Team.The establishment of the Golden Team can be traced back to the Peace Treaty of Trianon. In 1920, the leaders of the Horthy government defined physical education and sports as priorities in the reconstruction of the nation's soul, as the punitive treaty imposed severe restrictions particularly on politics, military affairs, and on aviation. By 1936, Hungary became a sports superpower; Hungary finished third in the Berlin Olympics medal table. In the 1938 FIFA World Cup, Hungary finished the second. The brutal communist dictator Rákosi(responsible for murders, tortures, imprisonments, forced relocations) and his gang also recognized the potential for propaganda in sport, so the sporting superpower position of Hungary was maintained also under the auspices of the communist dictatorship. Hungary finished third in the Helsinki Olympics in 1952. Shortly after in 1953, the Golden Team defeated England, the birthplace of football. The Rákosi regime stole football from the club system, so the Golden Team came to and end in 1956 together with the communist dictatorship. After 1956 the communist Kádár (responsible for the execution by hanging of around 500 young revolutionaries and freedom fighters) regime still continued, even if at a lower level, to use football for propaganda purposes, so the Hungarian football suffered another setback in the 1980s, when the communism of Soviet origin collapsed.The story of the Golden Team became one of a golden age which is lost forever, interwoven with legends. Does that age have a real message for today's football players and sports enthusiasts? Can we, the few survivors say anything relevant to the athletes and fans of another age? This book brings back a legend trying to look beyond it. How did the Golden Team travel by international airplanes? What kind of hotels did they live in? Did the elite athletes appreciate their privileged life, when the average person lived in poverty, without passport, western visa and western currency, often having been terrorized?