10/05/2023

10th May 1947. Four British Football Associations - England, Scotland, Northern Ireland and Wales - have had something of a love-hate relationship, over the years, with FIFA, the governing body of world football. Having joined FIFA in 1906, in 1928 - not for the first time - the four home country FAs withdrew from FIFA, this time due to a disagreement over FIFAs proposal to allow 'broken time' payments to amateur players. 

The four rejoined FIFA in 1946 and so on May 10th 1947 Hampden Park in Glasgow hosted a friendly between Great Britain and the Rest of Europe to help celebrate that re-unification. The fixture was described as 'The Match of the Century' with the GB side consisting of English players Frank Swift, George Hardwick, Stanley Matthews, Wilf Mannion and Tommy Lawton while Archie Macaulay, Billy Steel and Billy Liddell were from Scotland, Billy Hughes and Ron Burgess from Wales and although Jackie Vernon was the only Northern Irish player the opposition included Johnny Carey, an Irishman from south of the border. Goals from Mannion (2), Lawton (2), Steel and an og saw GB win 6-1 with an amazing 137,000 crowd producing £35,000 in receipts which was donated to FIFA. Rejoining FIFA meant that the home nations could enter the World Cup and there were great hopes that they would dominate that competition. If only!