BRITS AND FIFA

The British Football Associations did not join FIFA, when the international federation was founded in 1904. They initially took a year to reply to the invitation to join and then turned it down! What do you know about the FA at this time? The FA eventually deigned to join up and then were at loggerheads with the rest of the World. One issue was that England, Scotland, Wales and Ireland wanted to join as separate nations. The concept of the United Kingdom (Great Britain??) was ignored and the four nations were invited to join separately. The British associations refused to cooperate with their historic Great War enemies even after hostilities had finished. 

There was also the concept of "broken-time" payments, which was a means of compensating amateur players who represented their countries in the Olympics. FIFA agreed with this, but the British Associations did not, stating that players were either amateurs or paid professionals, with no middle ground. The decision to leave FIFA was costly, which meant that there was no invitation to the first three World Cup competitions. The English FA turned down the invitation to play in the 1938 tournament, as a non-FIFA nation, offered because Austria, a country "swallowed up" by Nazi Germany, had become unable to attend.

After the War, the British realised that the "world of football" was happy to move on without them. The four home nations were re-invited and given separate votes in "council". This was celebrated by a match at Hampden Park between Great Britain and The Rest of Europe, played at Hampden Park in May 1947. This raised £35,000 for the post-war FIFA and Britain won 6-1. 

The isolationist policy showed up however, with England humiliated in their first World Cup outing. In the 1950 Qualifying pool, hosted in Brazil, England lost 0-1 to The USA in Belo Hozizonte (June 29th); clearly not adjusted to post war international football

Before the qualification competition, George Graham (not the one we know!), chairman of the Scottish Football Association (SFA), had said that Scotland would only travel to Brazil as winners of the Home Championship (England, by contrast, had committed to attending, even if they finished in second place). After Scotland ended up in second place behind England, the Scottish captain George Young, encouraged by England captain Billy Wright, pleaded with the SFA to change its mind and accept the place in Brazil; however, Graham refused to change his position and so Scotland withdrew from the tournament.

The 1954 World Cup tournament, used a unique format. The sixteen qualifying teams were divided into four groups of four teams each. Each group contained two seeded teams and two unseeded teams. Only four matches were scheduled for each group (heaven knows why!), each pitting a seeded team against an unseeded team. This contrasts with the usual "round-robin" in which every team plays every other team: six matches in each group. Scotland lost to Austria 0-1 in their first group match and then was thumped by Uruguay 7-0  England won their group, beating Switzerland 2-0, and drawing with Belgium 4-4. losing in the "Quarters" in Basle,  to Uruguay 4-2. It took a while for both countries to get back to some sort of normal globally.