Whilst the national team was enduring a serious case of self-criticism, the Molineux club was celebrating the installation of their new floodlights with a series of high-profile friendly games against clubs from far and wide. Those players would also kick start what would become the major club tournament in European football. It would come from the industrial ‘Black Country’ area of the Midlands and the players donned in the old gold and black of Wolverhampton Wanderers. Suffice to say then, that the state of English football towards the end of 1954 was in need of a boost. Even when they finally joined the international jamboree in 1950, England embarrassingly lost to the USA. International defeats had probably only been delayed anyway by a refusal to participate in Fifa’s nascent World Cup tournaments. Then the Hungarian matador thrust the estoque into the John Bull-esque arrogance. A number of defeats to Scotland, Wales and Ireland had already inflicted picador-like thrusts. To be fair, the cosseted perception of England being atop the international game was considerably overstated even before the Hungarian humbling. There now seemed to be an inescapable conclusion that away form the shores of Britain, football had moved on, whilst the English game hadn’t been looking. The 7-1 defeat endured was even harsher, and the water in the bucket was even colder. Six months or so later, England visited Budapest for a return fixture, confident that things would be different this time. There was a determination to convince everyone that things weren’t all that bad. The ice cold water of the beating washed away any English delusions, but the national team stood up and shook itself off. Rather, it was the sort of beating handed out by players of a different calibre, playing a system that the home team found beyond them and with a skill level seldom experienced in the domestic game. It was the first time that England had endured a home defeat by so-called ‘international’ opposition but, as the scoreline painfully illustrates, this was no ‘smash and grab’ visit. Especially perhaps, England and Wolverhampton Wanderers skipper Billy Wright, who was described in The Times by Geoffrey Green as being like “a fire engine going to the wrong fire.” The problem being of course that the Hungarians were igniting so many fires with their scorching play, and the England skipper simply had insufficient hoses at his disposal. In The Guardian, the following day, Pat Ward-Thomas described the game as “a severe lesson in the arts of Association Football” and “probably the finest exhibition of attacking play that has been seen in an international match in Britain.” Few would have demurred from such a view. Ferenc Puskas, Sandor Kocsis, Nandor Hideguti and their compatriots comprising a team that would go almost a decade with just a single defeat recorded against them – albeit in the World Cup Final of 1954 – delivered the sort of sobering wake up call akin to being doused with bucketful of cold water after a long and particularly intoxicating night on the tiles. On a chastening November day at Wembley in 1953, any outdated and misguided ideas about English preeminence in the football world were cruelly banished by the cherry-shirted Magical Magyars of Hungary.
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